
/M 



LP 339 
.S8 P5 
1908 
Copy 1 



Syracuse Chamber of Commerce 



REPORT OF THE 



Committee on Education 



January 



19 8 




PUBLISHED BY THE 

SYRACUSE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE 

SYRACUSE, 1908 



SYRACUSE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE 



Report of the 

Committee on Education 



JANUARY, 1908 



COMMITTLL 
WILLIAM KLNT, Chairman 

A. B. BLODGLTT JOHN L. SWE.LT 

DLLMAR L. HAWKINS GLORGL D. BABCOCK 



ZER-UNION (TtKiQfflH P PUBL-ISHINS CO. 



OCT B' 






V CONTENTS 



^ Introduction --- 5 

The Public Schools of Syracuse 

by A. B. Blodgett 8 

The Industrial School 

by John L. Sweet 12 

The Syracuse Trade School for Women 

by George D. Babcock - - - - - - 16 

Education and Democracy 

by Delmar L. Hawkins - 18 

Recent Educational Literature 

by William Kent 47 

A Proposed Half-Time School for Office Boys 

by William Kent - 72 



Introduction 



The Committee on Education, appointed in the summer of 
1907, at its first meeting discussed the question which of the 
great number of topics that might be treated in a report un- 
der the broad title of Education was best entitled at the pres- 
ent time to study and consideration by a Chamber of Com- 
merce Committee. It was decided first, that there should 
be a brief presentation by Mr. Blodgett, Superintendent of 
Schools of Syracuse, of some of the most important facts con- 
cerning our city schools, for the general information of our 
citizens; second, that all questions relating to our state public 
school system as it now exists, our academies, colleges and 
universities, which are fully treated in the annual reports of 
the State Bureau and of the local Board of Education, and dis- 
cussed every year in various conventions, be for the present at 
least passed by ; and third, that the principal work of the Com- 
mittee be the study of the most important question now before 
the educational world, viz : What is being done, and what 
should be done to provide for the education of the great 
mass of our future citizens who are leaving the schools at or 
under the age of 14 years? This question was discussed at 
length and it was then decided to divide the work of the Com- 
mittee among its several members, so that each one should 
make a written report to the whole Committee on the par- 
ticular phase of the question assigned to him. Mr. Blodgett 
was assigned the subject of the Public Schools of Syracuse; 
Professor Sweet, the Industrial School for training of ma- 
chinists, with especial reference to the Artisan School in Syra- 
cuse, of which he is the founder ; Professor Babcock, the Trade 
School for Women ; Prof. Delmar E. Hawkins, formerly Pro- 
fessor of Political Economy in Syracuse University, Education 
in its Relation to Society at Large ; and the Chairman of the 
Committee. Recent Educational Literature with Especial Ref- 
erence to Industrial Education. 

These separate reports having been read at a meeting of the 
Committee in their original forms, and discussed at length, it 
was concluded that the best report the Committee could make 
would be the presentation of each of these several reports, 
after suitable revision, under the name of its author. The Com- 



mittee therefore presents these individual reports and asks 
that they be printed. 

The Committee is imanimonsly of the opinion that the time 
has arrived when legislative action concerning industrial or 
trade education should be taken by New York State. 

Germany is far in advance of the United States in the mat- 
ter of industrial education. Massachusetts has taken the lead 
in the matter in the United States. Should not New York 
State follow the example of Massachusetts? 

It is suggested that the method adopted by the State of 
Massachusetts in approaching this subject is the best one pos- 
sible ; that is, the appointment of a commission to make an in- 
vestigation. If such a commission was appointed in New 
York State, it would not need to repeat the original work of 
investigation done by the Massachusetts commissions, but 
would only have to investigate the work which has been 
done in the other states in the promotion of industrial educa- 
tion, and to draw conclusions therefrom. 

The Committee respectfully recommends to the Chamber of 
Commerce that it should petition the Legislature of New 
York State in proper form to appoint a committee on industrial 
education, whose duty it should be to investigate and report 
what legislation concerning the subject of industrial education 
has been adopted in other states, and also the results obtained 
from such legislation, and within one year after its appointment 
to report to the Legislature an act for the promotion of in- 
dustrial education in the State of New York. 

William Ke;nt, 
John E. Sweet. 
A. D. Blodgett, 
Delmar E. Hawkins, 
George D. Babcock, 

Committee. 

The report of the Committee having been presented at a 
meeting of the Board of Directors of the Chamber of Commerce 
held on January 14th, 1908. and discussed by several members, 
the report was ordered to be printed and the following 
resolution Vv^as passed by a unanimous vote : 

Resolved, That the report of the Committee on Education 
be approved, and that a communication be sent to the Gov- 
ernor of the State, the Commissioner of Education, and the 
members of the State Legislature from this County, urging that 
the State Legislature appoint a committee on industrial educa- 
tion, whose duty it shall be to investigate and report upon legis- 

6 



lation concerning this subject adopted in other states, the results 
obtained therefrom, and the needs of industrial education in 
this State, and within one year after its appointment to report 
to the Legislature an act for the promotion of industrial educa- 
tion in the State of New York ; and that the Committee of 
Education of this Chamber be and is hereby made a special com- 
mittee to do any and all acts necessary or proper to carry 
this resolution into effect. 



The Schools of Syracuse 

By A. B. Blodgett, Superintendent of Schools 



The public school system of the city of Syracuse comprises 39 
school buildings. There was a total registration of 22,308 
pupils during the school year ending June, 1907, with an aver- 
age registration of 20,396. This small army receives instruc- 
tion from 517 teachers, principals and supervisors. 

Of the 39 buildings above mentioned, 34 are devoted to 
the elementary courses, one to manual training, two to High 
school work, one of which is a business and manual training 
High school ; one is a special school for backward and over- 
grown pupils, and one a Truant school. 

There are 26 Kindergarten classes in as many different 
schools in which are employed 40 trained kindgarteners. 

The growth of the schools as to pupils and teachers from 
1900 to 1907 is best presented in the following way: 

Total registration : High School 

Pupils. Teachers. Pupils. Teachers. 

1900 20,761 474 1,623 43 

1907 22,308 516 2,312 69 

You will notice the remarkable growth of 42.5 per cent, in 
High school registration in seven years, while the growth in 
total registration has been only 7.4 per cent, in the same period. 
Of the above increase in High school attendance, boys have fur- 
nished 56 per cent, and girls 44 per cent. This is a strong indi- 
cation that more and more the boys are giving attention to 
High school work, and this is further evidenced by the regis- 
tration at the Business High school where the number of 
boys and girls is practically the same. 

The rate at which children leave school at an early age is 
shown by the following table: 

Number of pupils of age from 13 to 18 years in the Syracuse 

Public Schools in 1907. 
Ave. Age. No. of Pupils. Per ct. of No. at 13 yrs. 

13 1,970 100 

14 1,580 80.2 

15 1,024 52.0 

16 566 28.7 

17 366 18.6 

18 177 9.0 



Course of Study. 

The course of study is complete from kindergarten to high 
school inclusive, and is divided as follows : One year in the 
kindergarten, eight years in elementary or grammar schools 
and four years in the high schools. Kindergarten pupils may 
enter at 4 years of age but the majority enter at 5. If pupils 
progress without loss of grade, graduation from the high 
school would occur at 17 years of age. But the loss of one 
year in time on the average is unavoidable. This cannot how- 
ever be considered actual loss in the proper advancement and 
development of the child. 

Kindergartens, Sloyd and Domestic Science received their 
initiative as a part of the public school course of study, as they 
usually have in every city, through the aid of several philan- 
thropic citizens. The Solvay Guild and the Women's Educa- 
tional and Industrial Union were the pioneers. Their efforts 
were seconded by Mr. A. C. Chase, who, in 1896 fitted up the 
first kitchen in one of our schools at his own expense. Sloyd 
and sewing immediately followed, and to-day we have six cen- 
ters for manual training and six centers for cooking. To these 
centers come the pupils of ten of our largest grammar schools. 
The sewing is carried on in the regular school rooms and no 
special equipment is required. 

Thus we have in somewhat full measure the foundations, the 
essentials of a course of study that should meet the needs of 
boys and girls up to the age of 14 years. But what shall we 
say of that particularly dangerous age of 14 to 16 years, 
when boys particularly are unsettled as to what their future is 
to be? Without something definite and of a live interest they 
begin to float and for two or three years danger and uncer- 
tainty is their environment. This is the school problem of 
the hour, and educators are giving more time and study to 
these years of school life than to all others combined. 

Future Needs» 

Our city schools need a fuller and more elastic development 
of manual training and domestic science to cover the 6th, 7th 
and 8th years of our grammar schools, and a continuation of 
the same in the most interesting way to catch and hold the 14 
to 16-year-old boys above mentioned who are prepared for 
high school work. 

In the Business High school, manual training is gaining in 
strength and popularity. A Supervisor has been elected to 
begin his duties January 1, 1908, and with the inauguration 
of this work in our south side High school and a proper unifi- 



cation of the work in both grammar and high school courses 
we shall be ready for a decided advance towards a line of in- 
dustrial instruction leading to the trades. 

At the same time something must be done for the girls, 
and this will of necessity be one of our future problems. A 
continuation in more advanced lines of our present work at 
domestic science may be its solution, at least this field is a 
proper matter for consideration. 

Special Schools or Classes. 

We have one special school whose specific work is to give 
overgrown and belated children an opportunity to advance 
more rapidly than they could in the regular grades. It is con- 
fined to pupils of the upper grades and has been the means of 
keeping many pupils in school who would have left their reg- 
ular classes because of size or backwardness as compared with 
other pupils. An extension of this work is desirable and is un- 
der consideration. 

Defective and Subnormal Children. 

It is a safe proposition to assume that the State or City 
owes to every child of school age all the education and train- 
ing he is capable of accepting or acquiring, and this implies 
at once the necessity of better equipment and instruction for 
defectives and cripples. 

How to reach the parents of subnormal children is a deli- 
cate matter. To supply the best methods of training for such 
children is an interesting problem. Yet it should be done, and 
unquestionably it comes within the province of the public 
schools to take up the work with such children as are not suf- 
ficiently defective to be confined to institutions. 

Cripples. 

A school for crippled children should be maintained at pub- 
lic expense and transportation provided when necessary. 

Medical Inspection. 

Our Board of Health has entered upon a close and thorough 
medical inspection of the schols both as to sanitation of build- 
ings and daily examination of the pupils for contagious and 
infectious diseases. It is a splendid work, not the least notice- 
able and beneficial effects being the more cleanly and whole- 
some appearance and condition of the children, and also a de- 
cided improvement in hundreds of homes. 

10 



But there is another important field, viz., that of the eye 
and the ear. It is much more difficult to detect and remedy this 
class of defections, but it should be done even to the employing 
of exports to carry it on. Hundreds of boys and girls never 
reach the maximum of their powers — in fact go wrong — 
through defective vision or hearing, and parents, teachers, the 
afflicted themselves, never know the real cause. The result is 
sometimes termed "Arrested development," but in no sense is 
it true. It is simply eye or ear trouble, or both, and these 
can be remedied if ascertained in time and rightly treated. 

High Schools. 

The new High school recently occupied has a maximum ca- 
pacity of 1,500 pupils. The North Side High school, to be 
ready a year hence, will have a capacity of 750, making a total 
of 2,250. No school building whose attendance is more than 
80 per cent, of its maximum capacity can be wisely and proper- 
ly administered, and no principal can meet the full demands 
of more than 1,000 pupils if he is to do what ought to be done 
for them individually. Eighty per cent, of 2,250 would call 
for accommodations for 1,800 students and as we have had 
already over 2,000 in regular attendance at one time, it will 
be seen that more high school accommodations must be pro- 
vided at no distant day. The proper location of a new build- 
ing would be in the near vicinity, probably to the north, 
of Burnet Park. 

Needs. 

The most pressing needs for the public school system of this 
city are: An extension of manual training and domestic 
science along lines indicated ; classes for defective and crippled 
children; future provision for High school students, and a 
close study of the conditions and the remedies for the floaters 
and the uncertain youth of the city. 



11 



The Industrial School 

By John E. Sweet 



From the number of letters received from all over the coun- 
try asking about the plan and progress of our Artisan school, 
there can be no question but that there is a widespread feeling, 
among the manufacturers at least, that there is a sort of in- 
struction or training needed that our training, trade, military 
or technical schools, colleges and universities do not supply; 
and that is the training of men of ordinary intelligence how 
to work, that they may be able not only to earn a living but 
to do the work that needs to be done. 

The training that is needed is a substitute for the old ap- 
prentice system, which has died out because the manufacturers 
of to-day can not afford to have apprentices. The investment 
required per boy renders it impracticable to get work enough 
from the boys to make it profitable. 

The belief is pretty general that there is a lack, and a fast 
growing lack, of good mechanics. There is a general feeling 
that far too many of our young men are drifting into idleness 
and worse. Statistics show that but a small percentage of 
those who learn trades end their lives in penal institutions. 
This is in itself enough to justify some movement in the di- 
rection of the establishment of schools of trades. 

Mr. Van Cleave, the President of the Manufacturers' Associ- 
ation, advocates the beginning of industrial training in the 
public schools at the age of ten or twelve years. This will call 
for a great addition to the cost of equipping and running the 
schools, and while it will be no detriment to any one to learn 
to use his hands, it will be adding another to the present over- 
burden of studies imposed on the pupils of the grade schools; 
although the addition of hand work for short periods is so 
like play that no study taking the same length of time could 
be added that would add so little to the burdens as manual 
training. 

As it requires about twice the room for each child to do hand 
woric that it does for book work, the additional room and the 
cost of tools and materials would be so great than the addition- 
al taxes for school purposes that Mr. Van Cleave's scheme 
would require is likely to delay it for many years to come. 

12 



There are already many schools established with the primary 
object of furnishing places where boys can learn a trade, but 
these have almost invariably fallen into the hands of school 
teachers who soon drift into emphasizing the book part of the 
work, and the hand work becomes of secondary importance. 

As an index of what is being done and attempted: The 
Pratt Institute of Brooklyn is perhaps the oldest, and one 
that gives more time to hand work than the technical colleges, 
but the course is shorter, and the graduates, while not full 
fledged workmen, perhaps because there is too little variety 
of work and too short time, are so well started that in the 
main they soon become good men. 

The Brown & Sharpe Mfg. Co. and the Baldwin Locomotive 
Works, and others perhaps, have so many apprentices that they 
make special provisions to train them. 

The cities of Springfield, Mass., and Milwaukee have trade 
schools as parts of their public school systems, something in 
the way of half-time schools. The manufacturers of Cincin- 
nati have an arrangement with the University to have half- 
time apprentices. The State of Mississippi has a special 
school of trades. At Indianapolis the United States Govern- 
ment sold to a group of citizens the abandoned arsenal, which 
is being used as a school for various trades, to which in foun- 
dry work the members of the National Founders' Association 
contribute. The General Electric Co. and the Westinghouse 
Electric & Mfg. Co., have established schools of their own. 

New York City has invested a million and a half in the 
Stuyvesant Industrial School for teaching in trades and art; 
and Mr. Carnegie has given several millions to establish such 
an institution in Pittsburg. A large amount of this money 
has been put into magnificent buildings. 

The Williamson Trade School near Philadelphia, the New 
York Trade School and the Jewish School in New York City, 
and the School of Trades in Milwaukee come nearer making 
working mechanics than any of the others, though in many 
cases the graduates instead of following the trade, find places 
as teachers in other trade schools or in higher positions. The 
total number of pupils as yet attending all these schools is so 
small that they have yet done relatively little to supply the 
great demand for skillful workmen. 

What all the manufacturers feel is needed is skillful work- 
men ; men who can do things and know why, and the only 
way to get them is through schools where to teach them just 
these things is the objective point. 

To say this is easy ; to do it is a very diflferent thing. To 
get the boys is difficult, because it is so hard to convince them 
and their parents that a trade to a boy who must earn his liv- 

13 



ing is as good as five or six thousands in money; and because 
so few parents are willing are believe their boys are not born 
to be Presidents of the United States. 

Another trouble is to get the instructors or to learn what 
kind of a man is required for an instructor. 

The problem is a complicated one, and what we are doing 
at the Artisan school is trying the experiment. 

In the Winona school at Indianapolis, where they are striv- 
ing the hardest to establish schools of trades, they are, it is 
luiderstood, somewhat troubled in getting students. They have 
not gone far in the machinist trade, which is the hardest to 
establish and by far the most expensive, as the outfit is ex- 
tensive per boy and the cost of material is excessive compared 
to such industries as plumbing and foundry work, where the 
material can be worked over and over and involve little loss. 

At the Artisan school the money paid in is about $26,000, 
of which about $21,000 has been invested in real estate and 
tools ; and the present plan will suffice for a dozen or more 
boys, or at the rate of $1,750 per boy. And $5,000 more will 
equip tools enough to accomodate twenty boys, or $1,300 per 
boy ; and it is doubtful if the limit of fifty boys was reached 
that the investment could be brought to less than $1,000 each. 

In the pattern makers' and Machinists' trades the product 
must be good enough to sell in the open market or to use 
in the shop, or if not the loss will be too great. 

The Artisan school has succeeded in making useful and 
salable goods with very little loss, but it is slow work ; and 
while a part of the time the product has brought perhaps one- 
quarter the cost of running expenses, if at the end of the three 
years' course it is able to meet running expensse it will be an 
achievement. 

One thing which confronts us is this: While at the tech- 
nical schools they have the pick of the boys, and the examples 
of the work they show is the pick of the picked, the schools of 
trades must be exactly what they are intended for, not the pick 
of the boys, but average boys who by practical training may 
be developed into skilled workmen. 

The first thing that confronted us and will confront others 
was to get the money to start with. The next is to get the 
boys ; this to begin with means that we must convince them of 
the value of a trade and that we are going to give them chance 
to learn it. 

Then comes the question of keeping the boys after we have 
secured them. This will either involve us in the possibility of 
inspiring them with pride in their work or else we must pay 
them for it, which will be a donation, for it is not possible to 

14 



make the school more than self-supporting- if nothing is paid 
the boys. 

We must build up the reputation of the school by turning out 
work of unquestionable quality. To teach the boys to do good 
work, we must do good work, which too, is the only way to in- 
spire them with pride in doing it. Later we must turn out 
mechanics who can do good work in good time — and this ques- 
tion of time may be the hardest problem in the lot, but we 
have not come to that yet. 

The large industries like the General Electric Co., the Bald- 
win Locomotive Works, etc., who have established apprentice 
schools, have advantages that make their enterprises success- 
ful ; but they train boys for themselves and for their specialties, 
which gives us no precedent to follow. 

The men should not only know how to do all kinds of work, 
but to do it in the best way, and that involves to a certain 
extent the why ; and this borders on the technology, which must 
be given as the work goes on and not as a special study. 

The school established to turn out accomplished workmen 
must turn out accomplished workmen and nothing else or it 
will fail in its purpose. To turn out teachers for other 
schools would be as much a failvire as to turn out indifferent 
workmen. 

The boy must want to work, must want to learn to make 
things, and he must take pride in the things he makes. 

The boy who learns to do honest work is quite likely to be- 
come an honest man ; and we must train them to do right by 
doing right by them, and teach them morality by example. 



LS 



The New York State Trades 
School for Girls. 

By George D. Babcock 



The New York State Trades School for Girls was established 
in Syracuse in January, 1906, by the Women's Educational and 
Industrial Union of Syracuse, as the result of action taken by 
the State Federation of Women's Clubs at its meeting in Bing- 
hamton, N. Y., in November, 1905. The Women's Union at 
that time possessed a house on Montgomery Street which was 
free from incumbrance, and the State Federation turned over 
to the Women's Union the sum of $5,000 for the purpose of 
assisting them to reorganize under the name of the New York 
State Trade School for Girls and to provide equipment for 
such a school. 

It was the belief of the founders of the school project that 
if a working example could be shown of such a school in oper- 
ation, its value to the State would become so apparent that the 
trade school idea would eventually become spread throughout 
the State. This was the object in naming the institution the 
"New York State Trade School for Girls," even though it still 
maintained almost a purely local character. 

After reorganizing in 1906, the New York Trade School for 
Girls set to work to improve the building on Montgomery 
Street. This had been barely completed and the school start- 
ed when the building collapsed in the spring of 1907, on account 
of faulty operations by an irresponsible contractor, which 
caused the foundations to give way and the building to collapse. 
An old residence on East Onondaga Street was then rented and 
the school started again. 

The fall of the building on Montgomery Street was a great 
loss, but the members of the association at once set to work to 
raise sufficient money to meet expenses, with the hope of re- 
building at some future time. The chief means of raising money 
are three: Membership dues, subscriptions, and an annual 
charity ball. In addition to this, the association has $2,000 in 
bank and the membership dues for this year which have not 
yet been reported on. The school still owns the lot on Mont- 
gomery Street, valued at about $17,000, on which is a mort- 

16 



gage of $8,000. It is the general sentiment of the association 
tiiat the school should be rebuilt on a less valuable piece of 
oroperty. . . 

Mrs. George F. Hadley is President of the association ; Mrs. 
Caleb C. Brown, Secretary, and Mrs. John J. Phillips, Treasur- 
er. 

The school takes girls from grammar schools who are un- 
able to go on with their high school work, and girls from the 
' high school who wish to fit themselves for the following trades : 
Dressmaking, shirt waist making, millinery, plain sewing, em- 
broidery, cookery, housework, care of children. The Trade 
School does not try to support them, but gives their education 
free. 

The school was a great success from the first, 325 pupils hav- 
ing been then enrofled. At present there are 104 pupils. It 
has been very fortunate in securing good positions for its 
graduates. The complete course occupies eight months. 

It is suggested that the Chamber of Commerce interest itself 
in assisting the Trade School for Girls to obtain legislative 
action allowing it an annual appropriation. Such an appropri- 
ation would make it possible to put up a building suitable for 
the needs of the school and to educate a greater number of 
girls in the domestic and other trades. It would also encourage 
the establishment of school of like character in other parts of 
the State. 



17 



Education and Democracy 

By Delmar E. Hawkins 



What is Education ? 



Agreement as to definition is three-fourths of the argu- 
ment. With the definition of education settled, the educational 
problem becomes comparatively simple. Professional educators 
might contend as to particular processes, but that difficulty is 
of minor importance, for with the essence or purpose of educa- 
tion given, the appropriate methods will readily suggest them- 
selves. There is a definition of education, so clear, so simple, as 
to be self-evident, a mere truism, viz : Education is preparation 
for the duties of life. Apply that definition to any age, covmtry, 
social class, or to any quality or grade of individual capacity ; 
it will invariably point to the system or process best adapted to 
the case. Times, conditions, needs, indeed, change. Society 
is not stationary, but is ever in motion. All institutions among 
civilized people are under constant preasure of change, and must 
be modified to adapt themselves to the changing environment. 
There can be, therefore, no fixed or permanent educational 
form or mechanism ; but there can be, and there is, a permanent 
educational ideal ; and that is — to fit man for his life work ; 
so to train, instruct, and discipline him, that he shall be qualified 
to live his life well, to perform successfully his particvtlar duties, 
and to fill his place in the great plan which Providence has 
marked out for all men. 

The Fundamental Question. 

The opportunities, interests, and duties of life are not the 
same for the modern boy or girl in Russia, Germany, England, 
China, America ; not the same in the fifteenth century and the 
twentieth ; not the same for the American boy of colonial days, 
of fifty years ago and of to-day. Consequently the educational 
system appropriate in each case will differ from that in every 
other. Yet the points of similarity are far greater than the 
points of difference ; for after all, human life everywhere and 
always is much the same. Life before the American boy and 
girl in the populous industrial or commmercial center is not 

18 



quite the same as in the small village or on the farm ; but here 
the points of similarity are still more numerous ; for Americans 
are all under one political and social system. There has been 
set up throughout this country a Democracy, in form at least, 
if not in fact. The primary educational question with us, there- 
fore, is — not how shall we adjust the courses of the elementary 
and secondary schools and colleges ; what studies shall be add- 
ed here or dropped there; whether subjects shall be taught in 
this way or that way ; whether there shall be evening schools,, 
vacation schools, manual training, commercial or industrial 
training; whether, as disciplinary studies, Greek and Latin are 
as valuable as Alathematics or something else — these are not 
fundamental questions of educational policy, but rather, this : 
What is the life that confronts the average American boy and 
girl of to-day? What must they be and do, in order to full- 
fill their proper destiny, and in order that this social structure 
erected upon the basic principle of liberty, equal opportunity, 
and justice, may not perish, and with it the aspirations and 
hopes of the world for generations to come? That question 
brushes aside technicalities and quibbles, simplifies the matter, 
and reduces the problem to its lowest terms. Our educational 
machinery must produce the kind of young men and women 
that can meet the situation that confronts them ; not youth that 
stand at the threshold of life dazed, crippled, and discouraged, 
because filled with useless information ; or indifferent, because 
guaranteed an idle competence ; but who face the conditions 
of life confidently, because prepared, and resolutely, because 
impelled by stern necessity and by the sense of duty. 

The Form of Democracy and the Reality. 

Democracy is the organic expression of high average intelli- 
gence and character. It is not a form or system imposed from 
without or from above or superimposed in any fashion, but 
rather a capacity and power that reside in the average citizen 
and is reflected, through his public activity, in a system of social 
justice. That real democracy does not exist in this country, 
and that the people are not now qualified to establish or main- 
tain such a system, is apparent to every intelligent observer. 
Bvit we have the political form of democrcy, manhood suffrage 
and the legal right to complete political liberty. We are, con- 
sequently, under the necessity of speedily raising the average 
citizen to the plane of self-government, or we are likely to see 
the fabric of our institutions crumble under the strain of 
demagogy and discontent ; for what limits are set to such forces,, 
with universal suffrage and majority rule? 

19 



Responsibility upon the Public School. 

Where does the burden of ressponsibility fall? Upon the 
Public School. It is there the whole issue rests. Give us an 
■educational system that will produce a Democrat — not a man 
with vague notions or theories about liberty, but a self-reliant, 
self-governed man, knowing his relation to his fellows, and fit- 
ted to begin the work of a useful life — and there need be no 
fear for the future. We shall level up the American people 
to the requirements of our form of government. We shall es- 
tablish true democracy. That is the only way we can establish 
it. Public education is the power we must invoke. The State 
must provide a system of elementary and secondary education 
free to all, and compulsory upon all. That system must be 
such in scope and method as will properly and reasonably qual- 
ify each member of society for the fundamental duties of citi- 
zenship. In other words, the educational system must meet all 
the demands of a democratic form of social organization. Its 
dominant purpose must be individual and social efficiency. 

The Fundamental Duties of Citizenship. 

What are the fundamental duties of citizenship which in- 
dividual and social efficiency demand? First — To uphold gov- 
ernment and to promote law and order and justice. Second — 
To do honest labor, and by industry and thrift to support one's 
self and the dependent members of one's family, and to con- 
tribute one's rightful share to the maintenance of public in- 
stitutions. Third — To possess health and strength of body, 
mind and character, in order to fulfill one's social obligations, 
as member of family and community. These are the political 
economic and social duties that rest upon every man and wo- 
man, and which, by early training, they should be prepared to 
meet. 

Education That Qualifies. 

It is at once apparent that no system of education that aims 
solely to cultivate or discipline the mind, or to develop "a sound 
mind in a sound body" ; or that teaches the "common branches" 
only ; or that provides, solely, even a general cultural course, can 
give the required preparation. In addition to a minimum of the 
general or cultural course as now understood, which seeks to de- 
velop the intellectual forces and the esthetic sense, and in ad- 
dition to physical training and instruction in the laws of health, 
there must be specific instruction in political knowledge, effect- 
ive training in the industrial arts, and thorough indoctrination 

20 



in practical morals. Political efificiency, industrial efficiency, 
moral and physical efficiency ; whatever else it may seek to ac- 
complish, education, in a democracy, must yield the largest 
possible measure of these. The form of self-government with- 
out the knowledge and power of self-government leads to des- 
potism. Industrial individualism, with its private initiative, 
private property, private businees, and private responsibility — 
without the assurance to every citizen of the power to earn a 
living — is an economic paradox ; it is the right and duty to earn 
a living, without the power or fitness. That leads to Socialism. 
Political and industrial democracy without the strength of 
manhood and character in its citizenship (if that were possible), 
would very soon collapse and fall to its natural low level. 

State Function* 

The objection may be raised that it is not the function of 
the State to provide trades or professions. In reply it may be 
said that State function is not a matter of a priori reasoning, 
but of practical necessity. It is the function of the State to do 
whatever is necessary for its welfare, providing the same 
would not or should not be done by private action. If in- 
struction in the industrial or domestic arts, in commercial or 
business knowledge — the indispensable equipment of the great 
mass of people for earning honest living and leading useful 
lives — if this is not or cannot be given through private means 
— and we know that it is not and cannot be — then it is the 
business of the State to provide such training. 

The Industrial Age Without Industrial Training;. 

This is "the Industrial Age" ; and yet no epoch of the world 
has left industrial training so completely to haphazard luck and 
chance. Slavery at least trained the young for their future 
work, and assured to each the opportunity to work. Serfdom 
did the same. But freedom, in releasing men from servitude 
and oppression, also threw them out upon their own resources. 
Machinery and steam power drove increasing millions of them 
from the land where a reasonably certain livelihood was ob- 
tainable, to crowded city and town, where irresponsible private 
interest, periodic oscillation of business, increasing tendency to 
centralization, the disintegration of trades through specialization 
or the division of labor, and the consequent disappearance of 
apprenticeship — where these have conspired not only to dimin- 
ish the certainty of earning a living — but have all but reduced 
to anarchy the industrial instruction and training of the young. 
Private philanthropy is utterly inadequate to undertake the 

21 



work. Private business cannot afford to do it. Labor unions 
are utterly unable to cope with it. Either the State must as- 
sume the responsibility or it will not be done at all. 

Superior Educational, Moral and Social Value 
in Industrial Training. 

It will be objected, also, that the young should not be in- 
discriminately forced into learning trades or business, thus pre- 
determining the bent of their future careers which they alone 
should determine, and then only after each has been sufficiently 
developed to make for himself a proper choice. 

Industrial education would not lessen or retard general intel- 
lectual development. It would not displace any other training 
of superior value. It would not restrict or unduly influence 
the choice of career, but rather, would enlarge and rationalize 
that choice. The study of nature's productive forces, and the 
methods of utilizing them ; the study of the materials, tools, 
and processes of the industrial arts ; learning how to do and to 
make useful and beautiful things that minister to the needs of 
mankind, and for which the world is willing to pay a price — 
these have not only a true educational value of the first order, 
but they have in addition practical economic, moral and social 
values of incalculable importance. The vast majority of the 
young are predetermined or destined for the industrial arts 
anyway. The very small minority who go into the professions 
would go there only after having the opportunity to discover 
that they are not better qualified by nature for industry or busi- 
ness. In any event, an alternative vocation would be useful 
to no small number of them. 

American Public Education. 

If we accept the above theory of education, what shall be 
said of our present educational system in the United States? 

That our public schools, in physical equipment, in ability 
and loyalty of teaching force and directing officials, and in 
generosity of public support, are the best in the world, there 
can be no doubt. But the point is this : Are they doing what 
should be required of them? Are they turning out the kind 
of product we need ? 

Education of the elementary and secondary, or common school 
grades, is mainly public and free. The private schools of this 
character are becoming less and less a factor. In 1904-5, of the 
total elementary enrollment, private constituted 7.23% ; of the 
total secondary enrollment, 20.5% ; or an average for both of 
7.8%. 

22 



Is Education Universal and Compulsory? 

Nearly all the States have compulsory education laws, re- 
quiring school attendance of children from seven or eight to 
fourteen, fifteen or sixteen years of age, for a period of from 
eight to forty weeks a year. Most States also have child labor 
laws restricting or prohibiting the employment of children un- 
der the age of ten, twelve, fourteen or sixteen years — in cer- 
tain occupations. The compulsory school age period is four 
years in one State (Md., outside of Baltimore City and Alle- 
gany Co.,) ; six years in nine States (Ariz., Col., Idaho, Nev., 
N. H., N. Dak., R. I., S. Dak., W. Va.) ; seven years in eleven 
States (111., la., Ind., Kan., Ky., Mass., N.J., N.M., Vt., Wash., 
Wis.) ; eight years in eleven States (Cal., Conn., Minn., Mont., 
Mo., Me., (Md.— Baltimore City and Afiegany Co.) ; Neb., N. 
Y., O., Ore., Utah) ; nine years in two States (Wyo., Mich.) ; 
ten years in one State (Pa.) The average compulsory school 
age period of all the States having compulsory laws is 7.2 years, 
of from 8 to 40 weeks each. However, the majority of the States 
have so conditioned their laws by permitting children of school 
age to work for the support of themselves or others ;or by per- 
mitting those who can merely read and write, or who are attend- 
ing night school, to be employed ; or by excusing attendance on 
other grounds — that the actual average compulsory school age 
period does not exceed six years. New York State places the 
compulsory school age period at 8 years (8 to 16), and forbids 
employment in any service of children under 14. Children 
between 14 and 16 are forbidden employment unless they have 
attended school 130 days during the preceding year and are 
able to read and write and cipher ; or, in first and second class 
cities, have completed the elemntary course, or are attending 
evening school 16 weeks a year. So much for the laws. 

Laws Inedequate and Uninforced. 

The above laws are not only inadequate, they are uninforced. 
Instead of a nominal seven and one-fifth years of from 8 to 40 
weeks each, the compulsory school period should be not less 
than eleven full years, 7 to 18, a period long enough to com- 
plete the high school training. All employment in school hours 
during that period, except in extraordinary cases to be deter- 
mined by responsible authority, should be forbidden. The State 
should then exact rigid enforcement of the law. 

Seventy per cent, of the children of school age in the United 
States are enrolled in the public schools. (76% in both public 
and private schools.) Seventy per cent, of those enrolled are 
in average daily attendance. In other words, scarcely half the 

23 



population of school age (5 to 18) are in regular attendance in 
the public schools, while thirty per cent, are not even en- 
rolled. In New York State about 70% are enrolled, and 76% 
of these are in regular attendance. In the city of Syracuse, the 
proportions are about 70% and 80%. 

Education and Self-Government. 

Is our educational system qualifying our future citizens for 
self-government ? 

The total schooling of the average pupil enrolled in the 
public schools of the United States is about 5 1-3 years of 200 
days each. That is, seventy per cent, of the young are getting an 
average of 5 1-3 years of schooling, while all of them should 
be getting eleven years. In other words, mathematically ex- 
pressed, our population is getting but thirty-five per cent, of the 
schooling it requires. About 95 in 100 of those of elementary 
school age at some time go to the elementary schools ; over 
three-quarters of them drop out before they have finished the 
course. About one in seven or eight of those of high school 
age attend high school ; about one-third of them complete 
the course. About one in forty of college age attend college ; 
about one-third complete the course. In other words, less than 
one-fourth of our future citizens are receiving a grammar 
school education ; about one in thirty, a high school education ; 
about one in 120, a college education. Does it appear from 
these facts that we are developing sufficient intelligence for 
self-government ? 

Moreover, for those who attend the elementary grades, what 
instruction is given in political knowledge? There is saluting 
the flag, singing of patriotic songs, and, perhaps, for a few 
of them, a glimpse at United States history. With the 
exception of a comparatively few progressive schools in some 
of the larger cities, there is no attempt at instruction in the 
principles, methods and ideals of democratic government, no 
specific preparation for political responsibility, even in the 
upper grades. Elementary education in Spain or Turkey or 
Russia might be the same. And yet 95% of our common scool 
pupils and 90% of all pupils in all schools of every kind, private 
and public, are in elementary grades. 

What practical instruction for self-government do the high 
schools give, for the one in seven or eight who enter them, one- 
half of whom drop out after the secon year? For the one-half 
who drop out, nothing; of the one-half that remain, perhaps 
50%of them study American history; and 25% study civil 
government or civics. Of the one in 40 that enter college, 
probably less than one-fourth take up political subjects. 

24 



Should we be astonished at incompetency and corruption, at 
bossism and machine politics, in American local government ? 
The general spirit that pervades our common schools, their 
social atmosphere and discipline, are decidedly democratic. 
But should there not be, through the upper grammar and 
through all the high school grades, in appropriate and im- 
pressive form, systemative indoctrination in the essential prin- 
ciples of democracy? Can there be adequate preparation for 
democracy without knowledge of democratic government ; of 
the conditions and laws of its life and health, and of its decay 
and death? 

The four courses of study (Classical, Latin Scientific, Mod- 
ern Language, and English) which, according to the U. S. 
Commissioner of Education, serve as models for high schools 
and academies throughout the country, and which were 
recommended to the National Educational Association in 1893 
by the "Committee of Ten" on Secondary School Studies, — 
these courses are filled with studies of ancient languages, 
modren foreign languages, and English ; mathematics, natural 
and physical sciences ; with a little history sparingly thrown 
in. American history is not mentioned ; neither is political, 
social, or moral science. Greek, Latin, French, Botany, and 
€ven Meteorology, however, are considered as quite essential 
to the education of an American citizen. If this is the best the 
National Educational Association can do for American edu- 
cation, — let us call in a committee of business men selected at 
random from almost any city in the United States, and request 
them to draft new courses of study for our high schools and 
academies. 

Should Children of the Poor be Allowed to Work 

It may be said that to make the compulsory school period 
eleven years (7 to 18) and strictly enforce the law, would be 
impracticable if not undesirable ; that many parents are unable 
to dispense with the labor or wages of their children ; that 
children are often thrown upon their own resources for sup- 
port ; that it is better to let them aid themselves or their 
parents than to call upon public or private charity for help. 

Who gains most from democratic government? Who most 
insistently demands it? The poor. They will have nothing 
less. Why should any of them ask, then, to rear their chil- 
dren in ignorance? Besides, children have certain, at least, 
moral rights — food, clothing, shelter, and, in this country, a 
public school education. If these cannot be provided, parents 
have no moral right to the possession or control of children. 
At least, healthy, able-bodied parents who, through their own 

25 



fault, fail to supply this minimum, have no such right, and 
they should be sternly dealt with by the law. Such unnatural 
parents are found in almost every large community. Modern 
legislation is full of expedients for the defense of helpless child- 
ren whose lives are coined by lazy, able-bodied parents. In any 
case, the State cannot afford to allow children to grow up 
without schooling. Ignorance is far more expensive to the 
community than education. Indigent parents, incapacitated 
for work, or unable to get work, should receive public aid, or 
be provided with public employment. 

Education and Self-Support. 

To what extent is our educational system qualifying the 
young for the economic duties of citizenship? 

In 1904-5, out of 1214 city and village school systems of the 
United States, 420 were teaching some sort of manual train- 
ing, "in some of the grades." These were mostly in cities of 
8,000 population or over. In the same year there were 209 
manual and industrial schools, with 29,596 elementary, and 
44,346 second grade pupils. There were, also, 62 agricultural 
and mechanical colleges, in which, in addition to liberal 
courses, courses in agriculture, horticulture and dairying, and 
in the mechanic arts, were given. In these colleges were 
54,947 students. A few States in the West and South have 
recently begun to establish agricultural and mechanical high 
schools, and to introduce into the regular high schools, 
studies in agriculture. In the same States there is a move- 
ment for the introduction into the common schools of rural 
communities of nature studies and elementary agriculture. 
The commercial or business course is becoming more and more 
prominent in the curriculum of the average high school and 
academy. Industrial and technical high schools are being es- 
tablished in several cities. There is also a widespread feeling 
among educators, among business men, and among labor 
leaders that educational policy must be changed if we are to 
meet the pressing needs of the mass of the people. 

This is something of a showing for industrial education ; but 
it is only a beginning. In order to make any substantial im- 
pression on the country, the movement must be widely and 
speedily extended. The "manual training" given in "some 
of the grades," in one-third of the village and city school sys- 
tems, is not iudusfrial training, but, at best, only a part of the 
rudiments of it. In the year 1905 there were 12,000,000 pers- 
ons between the ages of 12 and 18 years. During that year 
there were enrolled in Manual and Industrial Schools, 73,942 
pupils ; in Normal Schools, taking professional course, 

26 



93,640; in agricultural and mechanical colleges, pursuing 
courses in agriculture and mechanics, 30,000; in professional 
schools and colleges, 61,372; in schools of technology, 
16,000; in business schools, 146,086; in general schools and 
colleges, taking business or commercial studies, 116,712; in 
schools for nurses, 19,824; in reform schools, receiving 
some industrial training, 30,378 ; in schools for defectives, 
receiving industrial training. 32,000; — a total of 619,954 
persons receiving more or less special or vocational training. 
That is, — with a vocational school population, between the 
ages of 12 and 18 years, of 12,000,000, there were 619,954 or 
about one in twenty in training. But of this number, probably 
one-half were above the age of 18. If we extend the vocational 
school age to 22, the total vocational school population would 
be 18,000,000, and the proportion of those in training, — about 
one in thirty. How many of the 619,954 fully completed their 
courses of training? Probably not to exceed one-half. It is 
therefore quite probable that in 1905, not more than one in 
sixty between the ages of 12 and 22 years, were receiving in 
schools thorough instruction or training for their life work. 
If this is an age of industry and specialization, our schools 
show little indication of it. 

The Daty to Labor^ and the Importance of Wealth. 

Every living person is a consumer. Within reasonable 
bounds of age, health and strength, he should also be a pro- 
ducer. If he does not produce at least the equivalent of what 
he consumes, he must take from the share of others. The 
working-age, under present economic conditions, should prob- 
ably be from the twentieth to the sixtieth year. During that 
period, all persons of both sexes, while not incapacitated, or 
in the higher schools, should be doing useful work. Are 
they doing it? According to the census of 1900, there were, 
at that time, 2,500,000 youth between the ages of 10 and 20 
years not attending school, and not employed in any gainful 
occupation. There were also 1,000,000 men between the ages 
of 21 and 60, idle. There were 14.000,000 women between 21 
and 60 years of age, unemployed in gainful occupation, 
1,000,000 of whom could probably be classed as idle. It is 
expected that the young and the old, the incapacitated and 
those attending school, will be provided for without work on 
their part. But here is an unjust and an unnecessary burden 
of from five to eight hundred millions of dollars for the annual 
support, mainly of the idle. 

Lack of employment will not account for this heavy burden ; 
the census year was an unusually prosperous one. It can 

27 



nearly all be accounted for by the lack of industrial education.. 
Eighty-five percent of the present working population (those 
who work for pay) are engaged in producing wealth, i. e. 
material utilities. ; about five percent are engaged in profess- 
ional service ; the other ten percent are in various forms of 
personal service. Every institution, agency, or activity among 
men, depends, for daily existence, upon the steady production 
and supply of material wealth. The advance of civilization, 
the amelioration of human conditions, the realization of social 
and ethical ideals, — all depend upon the progressive production 
and accumulation of wealth, especially in its capital form. The 
life and health, and to a large extent the discipline and char- 
acter, of 85% of the working population, must be derived 
directly from their employment in the industrial or commercial 
field. No command of the Decalogue is more explicit than 
the command to labor six days of the week. That there could 
be any physical, mental, or moral health or growth without 
systematic labor, was contrary to the eternal laws of God 
and of Nature. Stop the wealth producing agencies of the 
world for one year, and nine-tenths of the human race would 
disappear from the face of the earth. Could the world accum- 
ulate wealth enough to supply all its needs for a generation, 
and then live in idleness, — the remnant of virtue inherited by 
the following generation would be too small to save it from 
extinction. 

The Useful before the Ornamental. 

When it is known that 18 out of every 20 of the adult 
population must work for an honest living; that 17 of the 18 
must work at some trade, or some industrial or commercial 
pursuit ; that no part of our social system can function without 
a continuous production and supply of wealth; that human 
capacity and character, apart from labor, speedily decay; — 
when these things are known, is it not astonishing that our 
public school system should so long have disregarded the 
practical and fundamental needs of popular education? 
"First — what is necessary; next — what is useful; then — what 
is ornamental" ; that, and not the reverse, should be the order 
and emphasis of our common public education. Load our 
youth down with "accomplishments" as we will ; gild them 
with "culture" ; adorn them with "classic learning" ; give them 
wit, fluent speech, and polished manner, — all of them, — and 
yet leave out the practical skill of hand and brain, the power 
to create useful things, the ability to perform necessary service, 
readiness to supply the common wants and to do the common 
work of life, — leave out these, and we should not only deprive 

28 



them of superior educational training, but should implant with- 
in them false and pernicious ideas of life, and rob them of the 
very thing upon which their existence depends, and which, in 
one decade, does more for the human race than all the refined 
learning of a thousand years. 

The sad and disastrous mistake of an unpractical education, 
is well illustrated by results obtained by the Salvation Army's 
Anti-suicide Bureau during its first year in London, 1907. Of 
1,125 hopeless and dispairing men and women of the middle 
class who applied to the Bureau for consolation and advice, 
"most of them", we are informed, "had had a superior edu- 
cation which rather unfitted than qualified them for work with- 
in their reach." 

The System We Should Have. 

There should be a public system of industrial education, — 
universal and compulsory. It should begin in the primary, 
and extend through the grammar and high school grades, and 
should run parallel with the general courses. In the elementary 
grades, the rudiments of trades and industry should be acquired 
by the boys, and the elements of domestic economy by the 
girls. In the high school, trades and domestic economy should 
be completed. In rural communities, instruction in the 
elements of general agriculture should be given in the grammar 
grades, and every county should have its agricultural high 
school. Every city of considerable size should have its 
commercial or business high school, or business courses in the 
regular high school. Professioinal, engineering, and the ad- 
vanced technical, art, and agricultural courses, would be oflfered 
in the public and private universities. Thus we should have a 
complete system of industrial education. Every boy at the age 
of 18 or 20, would, in addition to his general intellectual 
training, be fitted and ready either for scientic farming, skill- 
ful craftsmanship, or industrial pursuit, or efficient business 
according to his particular high school training ; while the way 
to higher technical or professional education would be open to 
those whose inclination and capacity should lead them in that 
direction. Every girl, in addition also to her general edu- 
cation, would know the various arts of practical house-keeping; 
if she were inclined to enter business, or some trade, as in most 
cases she would, or the higher education, the needful training 
would be open to her. 

Practical Results of Such a System. , 

What would be the effect of such a system of education? 
Social conditions, in the space of a generation, would be 

29 



revolutionized. The non-producing adult population would be 
reduced to a minimum, and a heavy burden lifted from the 
community; the criminal class, which costs the state millions 
of dollars every year, would vastly lessen ; not only would the 
working population be considerably increased, but their average 
producing power would be doubled, the standard of living 
correspondingly raised, and wealth available for every benefic- 
ent social purpose increased in like ratio; childhood, early 
youth and old age would be exempt from toil ; contempt for 
manual labor, — a not unnatural result of a system of education 
that points particularly to the college and the "honorable" 
professions, — contempt for labor, the worst curse that can be- 
fall a people, would be eradicated, giving place to a respect for 
labor, honest pride and satisfaction in its achievements, and 
an increasing preference for the industrial arts ; crowding of 
the so-called "respectable" callings to the point of poverty, 
would cease ; the professions would not be glutted, nor the 
ranks of unskilled labor; artisanship would receive the brains 
and character to make it what it should be ; all occupations 
would be far better adjusted, distributed and remunerated; 
while the growing demand for social reconstruction, not alto- 
gether unprovoked, would lose much of its force. These are 
tremendous results, but they are not greater than their anteced- 
ent cause . 

Misapplied Education — Not Over-Education. 

Leading men of Germany are reported to be crying out 
against what they term^over-education". The output of the 
higher institutions of learning is said to be so great that a 
professional man can scarcely command a decent living. For 
example, the average salary of a university-bred engineer is 
stated to be $515 a year. 

Germany is not suffering from over-education, nor is any 
other nation. The evil, wherever it may exist, is misdirected, — 
misapplied, — education. Popular or social education should 
be such as to give, as nearly as may be, a rational balance or 
ecjuilibrium to social labor forces; just as individual education 
should give a symmetrical, well-proportioned development to 
individual powers. Education, like any other output, may glut 
the market with its particular product. Over-production, how- 
ever, is vastly more wasteful and harmful in education, than 
in the commercial world. Material commodity is insentient, 
and can wait for a purchaser. Fixed capital may often be 
converted. But human labor cannot wait for a purchaser, nor 
convert its skill into other forces. Popular education should 
be so distributed, adapted, and proportioned as to comprehend 

30 



the various degrees and kinds of human capacity and aptitude, 
and to lead each to its proper sphere of usefulness. Maximum 
efficiency of all the people, in all their respective and appro- 
priate fields of activity, — that should be the aim of public 
education. 

Expense of Industrial Education System. 

But, what of the expense of universal industrial education? 
Additional buildings, equipment, and teaching force. Would 
it not be greater than the public would bear, or than present 
economic conditions would warrant? 

The total value of the public school plant of the United 
States in 1904-5, was $733,446,805. The total expenditure of 
that year for maintenance and extensions was $291,616,660., 
i. e. 16.8 cents per day or $25.40 per year for each pupil in 
daily attendance ; and $3.53 per capita of the total population. 
Assuming that the cost of an industrial education plant and 
expense of maintenance and extensions would be fully as 
great, — the people would have to double their annual ex- 
penditures for public education. Could they do it? Would it 
pay in dollars and cents? 

Whether or not they could do it. is a question of net income. 
The average annual net addition to the wealth of the country 
is about $30 per capita. One eighth of this annual net accum- 
ulation would operate and maintain the system. Ten dollars 
a year per capita from those employed in gainful occupations 
would pay the bill. One sixth of the amount annually spent 
for the luxuries of drink and tobacco would pay it. An increase 
by 16 2-3% in the revenues derived from taxation, would pay it. 
Buildings and equipment could be paid for out of long term, 
low interest state bonds. Interest, sinking fund, and de- 
preciation charges would not add more than one seventh to 
the above estimated annual expenditure. The complete install- 
ation of plant would probably require a period of ten or fifteen 
years. This would distribute the burden. The increase in that 
time, in national wealth and in revenues from taxation, would 
offset the above one-seventh. 

Would the Investment Pay? 

Would it pay in dollars and cents? The state and locality 
would derive revenue from industrial education, indirectly, 
through the increased producing power of the population and 
the consequent increased amount of wealth available for tax- 
ation. A universal income tax, in this case justifiable — for it 
would rest upon a universal producing power created by the 

31 



state, — would yield larger revenues than a property tax. The 
state and locality would also save large sums now spent for 
charity, and occasioned by crime. We have stated the opinion 
that industrial education would, in the course of a generation, 
increase the amount of national income by 100^ over and 
above what it would otherwise be. If that be true, then public 
revenues could probably be increased 100% without raising 
the rate of taxation. 

Mr. James M. Dodge, in an address in 1903, to the Amer- 
ican Society of Engineers of which he was president, made 
the following calculations : At the age of 22 years, the produc- 
ing or earning power of unskilled labor, is $10.00 per week; 
of labor trained in the technical school, $13.00 per week; of 
shop-trained labor, $13.50; of labor trained in the industrial or 
trade school, $17.00. Ten years later, at the age of 32 years, 
the producing power of these same men would be : — 

Unskilled labor, $10.20 per week, an increase of 20 cents. 
Shop-trained labor, $15.80 per week, an increase of $2.30 
Industrial school labor, $25.00 per week, an increase of $8.00 
Technical school labor, $4 3.00 per week, an increase of $30.00 

If we estimate that labor trained in the industrial school 
will produce, during the working period of life, — say 40 years 
from 19 to 59, an average of $10 per week more than unskilled 
and shop-trained labor, — what would that be worth to the coun- 
try? Taking the population of 1900 and assuming that it re- 
mains stationary, in the space of 40 years, thirty million men 
would have been put through the industrial schools ; of these, 
twenty million would constitute the working force. At the end 
of the period, 500,000 men would have worked 40 years ; 500,000 
men 39 years ; and so on down to 500,000, one year. Now, 
charging against the system the original investment — $733,446,- 
805; also the accumulatingannual expenditures for operation and 
maintenance ; and add to these annual fixed charges for interest, 
depreciation and sinking-fund ; and assume that the system 
must run five years before returns begin; — could there be any 
financial profit from such an outlay? The profit accruing 
would be as follows : — the first working year, i. e. the sixth 
year of the system, would show a yield in increased product of 
10.4% on the total investment ; the fifth year, a yield of 82.2% ; 
the tenth year, 214.8% ; the twentieth year, 504.8% ; the forti- 
eth year, 1114%. In the fortieth year, the sinking fund would 
have liquidated the bonded debt or original cost of the plant. 

In the above calculation we have assumed the increase in 
producing power to be 16.66% less than that given by Mr. 
Dodge ; the working year is estimated at only forty weeks ; no 
increase in the working population is allowed ; the vast gain in 

32 



the productivity of the labor of women, in the trades, in busi- 
ness, and especially in domestic arts, is entirely eliminated. And 
yet, with such enormous discounts, forty years of industrial 
education will yield an increased labor product of one hundred 
sixty-four billion dollars, upon a total outlay of less than four- 
teen and three-quarter billions! i. e. a profit of 1114%. Such 
is the gain in the product of labor; what would be the gain in 
the product of capital due to the co-operation of more efficient 
labor? If the increased product of capital were but 2%, that, 
even with conditions of 1900 stationary, would amount to at 
least 16.40 billions of dollars in the forty year period, or more 
than enough to wipe out the whole cost of industrial education. 
Would industrial education pay? Indeed, is there any other 
form of public investment that will pay anything like such 
profit? New York state is putting one hundred one millions, 
and no one knows how much more, in a barge canal.. What 
net profit will that show after forty years of use ? The nation- 
al government, we are now told, should spend five hundred 
million dollars for the improvement of the Mississippi river 
and its tributaries. Money well spent, perhaps. But which do 
we need most, just now, lower freight rates or working efific- 
ciency among our people? Which would yield the larger div- 
idends? Accumulate capital, multiply captains of industry, 
build lines of transit, and add to other commercial facilities as 
we will, — if the mass of labor is untrained and inefficient, 
our economic progress will not only be relatively slow, but its 
path will be beset with the menace of social discontent and 
political turbulence. Two or three hundred dollars put into the 
industrial training of a boy, who subsequently works during the 
full period (from his 20th to his 60th year), will yield sixteen 
thousand dollars. We are called a practical people. And yet, 
while we wax eloquent over trade schools for indians, negroes, 
lunatics, and criminals, we pass over the mass of our white 
population as though they were to be fed from the skies, or 
M^ere especially exempt from labor by Divine Providence. If 
industrial education is good for any race or condition of men, 
it is good for all men. 

Trade Follows the Trade School. 

We should take counsel of the German people, whose scien- 
tific spirit has placed them in the lead of the educational 
world, and has made Germany, everywhere, the synonym for 
educational thoroughness and progress. Germany has es- 
established her industrial schools by the hundreds. Why? 
Because she knows that her growth and prosperity depend, 
largely, upon the ability of her people to produce efficiently, 



and that depends upon their industrial training. Germany is 
conquering markets in every quarter of the globe, — not by her 
"flag", but by her industrial and technical schools. 

The United States has entered upon the stupendous task of 
opening and keeping open the commercial door of Asia, the 
future economic battle ground of nations. What benefit are we 
to derive from it? A giant navy with the Phillipine base will 
maintain our undisputed entrance to the field ; but economical 
production and transportation can alone match the resources 
of our competitors. The "open door" will mean to us only a 
heavy burden of expense, unless we are to pass through it 
with marketable products. "Trade follows the Flag" — express- 
es a truth of a past age, when commercial policy meant national 
monopoly of colonies or exclusive "spheres of influence". Over 
the entrance to the market of the future is the legend — 
Trade follows the Trade School. 

Crime and Industrial Ignorance 

Under the heading — "Idleness The Gateway To Prison", — 
Mr. Speed Mosby, Pardon Clerk for the state of Missouri, 
states the following in a recent magazine article: — "Two- 
thirds of the convicts in the Missouri penitentiary are men 
without trade or profession. One-third of the convicts there 
confined — are young men, ranging in years from eighteen to 
twenty-five. Nearly all of these came to prison absolutely 
zvithout the knozvledge of any useful and gainful occupation. 
Considerably more than half of those convicted of crime are 
ignorant of any kind of trade. Comparatively few of the 
younger are illiterate. In my own experience, I have never 
met one who could not read or write, and very many (by far 
the greater number, I should say) are possessed of no small 
degree of intelligence. But, however stupid or however pre- 
cocious they are found to be, almost without exception they 
are young men zvho have not applied themselves to useful, 
honest work. This is true of both the poor and the well-to-do. 
There is no warrant for saying that the tendency toward crim- 
inality is naturally greater among the idle poor than among 
the idle rich. One frequently meets, behind the prison walls, 
young men of good parentage ; young men, too, who could not 
plead poverty as an excuse for crime. Idleness brings them 
there." 

That conditions in Missouri are not peculiar to that state, 
is made evident from an examination of other state prison 
reports and federal reports. The New York report for 1906 
shows that of those confined in the three state prisons on that 
date, 60% were without knowledge of skilled trade or profess- 

34 



ion, when committed. But of the 40% who possessed such 
knowledge, many, no doubt, had obtained it in penal and re- 
formatory institutions ; for 56% of all the prison inmates had 
been in penal institutions before. Of the 25,057 male major 
offenders committed to state prisons in all the states, in 1904, 
66% were without trades or professions, when last committed; 
while of the 90,930 male minor offenders committed in that, 
year, 76% were without trades or professions when last 
committed. Of the female major offenders, 94% had no 
trades. 

Incentive and Preparation. 

In the same magazine is an article by Lord Balfour of Eng- 
land, on "The danger of Socialism", in which the writer main- 
tains that the only way to prevent socialism from under-mining 
and overthrowing English civilization, is to make the incentive 
to individual efficiency the strongest possible, by securely pre- 
serving to the individual the net earnings of his labor. 

But of what avail, as an incentive, is law that protects priv- 
ate property and prevents plunder, — if the individual is not 
first qualified, fitted, to earn or acquire property? If socialism 
is making headway in England, it is due, in no small measure, 
to the antiquated, unpractical, one-sided system of education 
prevailing in that country. Socialism will advance in every 
modern state so long as similar conditions obtain. 

Education and Social Efficiency — Morals and Health. 

Now, as to the manner in which our educational system 
prepares our youth for the general social duties of citizenship. 
This is a question, largely, of moral character and of physical 
.Tiealth and vigor. Whatever instruction in ethics is given in 
the common scools, seems to be indirect, incidental or immed- 
iately connected with school discipline. That subject, as a rule, 
forms no part of the curricula. Moral Science, as we have 
before stated, is not even mentioned in the "Model High School 
Courses" that so generally serve as standards throughout the 
country. 

In divorcing church from state, morals were left to religion. 
If that was not so at first, it has become so, at least in this 
country. The church preaches morals ; the school trains the 
mind. Yet we all know that no social system can endure, that 
does not rest upon sound practical morals. The masses may 
or may not be in the churches. At present they are not there ; 
at least not the Protestant masses. But they are, will be or may 
be, in the schools. The school is the only sure opportunity to 

35 



give ethical instruction. Our youth are there, — receptive, 
plastic, impressionable. Never again does the opportunity re- 
turn. We cannot depend alone upon family or church for 
adequate moral instruction ; for will not these, in the long run, 
drop to the level of the school ? Not that the power of religion 
is derived from secular education ; but this, — a people who 
will not effectively apply, in their public education, the most 
vital part of their religion, — practical morals, — are quite likely 
soon to lose that religion, though they may retain its external 
forms and symbols. We cannot depend upon the Press; for 
the Press is little more than a reflector. Pulpit, Press, and 
Platform may thunder against wickedness as they will ; even 
though they were independent and original forces, their words 
will beat upon deaf ears, if God and morals be banished from 
the public schools. The laws of right and wrong conduct ; the 
simple virtues that make for the weal of individual, family, 
and state ; and the sins, vices and follies that enfeeble, corrupt, 
and destroy them, — these vital truths should be impressively 
taught throughout every grade and section of the public 
schools. Why not graduated studies and lessons in Moral 
Science for all the grades, just as we have graduated studies 
in Language and Mathematics? Are not right conduct, sanity, 
and purity, quite as important to this nation as reading and 
ciphering ? Let us implant in the minds of our youth, the sense 
of right and duty ; for without this, all other knowledge is vain. 

Physical health and vigor, while largely infleuenced by 
economic conditions and home training, may yet, in the long 
run, be determined by the school ; for, as we have indicated, 
the home as well as economic conditions are most sensitive and 
responsive to the school. School buildings are constructed 
with larger reference to the health and comfort of pupils ; 
physical exercise and medical inspection are more and more 
insisted upon. But, making the school building right and 
requiring physical exercise in school hours, is not enough. 
The pupil should knozv the specific conditions and lazvs of good 
health.. Diet, clothing, cleanliness, relative nutrutive values 
of foods, symptoms of common physical disorders and simple 
remedies, etc. One may be taught the structure and function 
of every part of the human body, and the evils of tobacco and 
drink, and still be ignorant of the art of physical wellbeing. 
Moreover, for the boys, during that most critical period, 
adolescence, beginning with the seventh grade of the element- 
ary and continuing on through the high school, there should 
be plain, full, and appropriate instruction by competent phys- 
icians. It seems, to say the least, most unfortunate, that 
matters of vast consequence to the individual and family, and 

36 



to the wellbeing of society, should be tabooed because of a false 
sense of delicacy or propriety, or because of pure neglect. 

Unfortunately, a public educational system, like most other 
public institutions, moving sluggishly in the wake of human 
events, is quite likely to be the result of the thought of 
yesterday ; the thought of yesterday, the result of the facts of 
the day before. How to keep education abreast of the age, 
squared with the conditions of the time, — is a problem well 
worth the attention of our ablest scholars and statesmen. 

Summafy of Conclusions, 

1. Education is preparation for the duties of life. 

2. Whatever the age, country, or condition, education 
should prepare the people to meet the primary demands im- 
posed by the existing form of social organization. 

3. Democracy can exist only in an atmosphere of high aver- 
age intelligence and character. Its primary demands or duties 
of life, are political, industrial and social efficiency. Failure 
to qualify the people for any one of these must seriously 
weaken the social struture ; continued neglect of all three is 
sure to lead to wide spread ruin. 

4. Education in the United States to-day is neither 
universal nor compulsory, except in name. But one-half the 
school population is regularly in school, while the majority of 
these receive less than a full elementary training. 

5. Instruction in political knowledge — specific prepar- 
ation for self-government, — is almost entirely lacking. 

6. While eighty-five in every hundred of the working 
population must engage in some branch of industry or 
commerce for a living, less than three of the eighty-five receive 
any practical training in our schools for their life work. But 
one in sixty of the total population of vocational school age 
is fully trained for his special vocation. 

7. Religious instruction is generally excluded from public 
education ; anything like direct, systematic or comprehensive 
teaching of morals is unknown. 

8. There is no adequate instruction as to the laws and 
conditions of physical health, while facts as to both health and 
morals, that fundamentally concern the wellbeing of individual, 
family, and state are utterly unmentioned. 

9. Every considerration of sound public policy and of cor- 
rect educational thinking, ocmpels us, with all reasonable speed, 
to eliminate from our public common school education what 
is antiquated or useless, and what is for mere ornamentation 

37 



or display; to frame a course so rationally balanced in its 
instructional, disciplinary and cultural studies, and in its 
physical and vocational training, that it will meet the vital 
needs and conditions of our common life ; to enroll the entire 
school population and keep them in regular attendance for the 
full educational period. — This is a remedy for social deformities 
and ills, that will cure. Most other reforms are but palliatives. 
For education is the only power that can consciously mould 
the unit of social life ; consequently, the only power that can 
determine, with purpose and design, the type of civilization 
and the speed of human progress. 



38 



Graphic Representations 

of Prominent Features of Ameri- 
can Education are shown on 
pages immediately following. 



39 



General School Education. 

Representing Elementary, High School and College Education Received by 
our [Population of School Age. 



Total Population 
of Elementary, 
and Secondary or 
High School, Age 
(5-18 yrs.) 1906. 



Enrolled in all 
Public and Private 
Elementary and 
Secondary 
Schools. 



In Regular 
Attendance. 



Number Com- 
pleting Element- 
ary Course 
(out of total, 
23,792,723.) 




100% 



76% 



54% 



18.5% 



40 



Number Enter- 
ing High Schools 
and Academies 
(out of total.) 




12.6% 



Number Com- 
pleting High 
School Courses 
(out of total.) 

819,696 



3.4% 



Number Subse- 
quently Entering 
Colleges and 
Universities (out 
of total.) 



438,080 

1.84% 



41 



Number Com- 
pleting College 
Course (out ol 
total.) 

160,000 

.67% 



Required Instruction in Government, Health and Morals — 
in High Schools. 

Representing the Distribution of Studies in Courses of Instruction Recom- 
mended to the National Educational Association in 1893, and since then, 
with some exceptions as to instruction in Government, and with the 
exception of such incidental and meagre instruction in Health as is given 
in Courses in Physiology and Hygiene, Generally Followed in 
both Public and Private High Schools and Academies. Also 
Showing the Relative Emphasis placed upon Government, 
Health and Morals. 



Total 

Time of 

Instruction 



This diagram will represent conditions as to required instruc- 
tion in Government, Health and Morals — in Elementary 
Schools also (with few exceptions as to Government and 
Physiology and Hygiene.) 



Time 

for 

Modern 

Foreign 

Languages 



Time 

for 

Natural 

and 
Physical 
Sciences 









Time 








Time 

for 

English 




for 
Mathe- 
matics 











100% 



25.6% 



24.7% 
42 



14.6% 



14.6% 



Time 

for 

Ancient 

Languages 


Time 

for 

History 

(nihpr 


Time for 

Required 

Instruction in 

Government 


Time for 

Required 

Instruction 

in Health 


Time for 






than 
U.S.) 


Required 
Instruction 
in Morals 








12.8% 




7.3% 


0% 

43 


0% 


0% 



Valttc of Industrial Education. 

Based on estimates made by Mr. James M. Dodge. 



Producing: Power of Labor at 22 and at 32 Years of Age. 

(Measured in weekly wages.) 



Unskilled Labor 
at 22 yrs. at 32 yrs. 



110.00 




$10.20 



Shop-trained Labor 

at 32 yrs. 



at 22 yrs. 



$13.50 



$15.80 



44 



Technical School 
Trained Labor 

at 32 yrs. 



Industrial or Trade School 
Trained Labor 

at ;2 yrs. 



at 22 yrs. 




at 22 yrs. 




$43.00 



45 



Vocational School Education. 

Representing the Extent to which Our Population is Specially Trained in the 
Schools for Life Work. 



Total Number of 
Persons of Vocational 
School Age (12-22 
yrs.) 1906 



100% 



(If the vocational school age given in the first column be 
shortened by 2 years, e. g. , — placed from 12 to 20 
years — ■ the percentages in the second and third 
columns will be increased by approximately one-fifth, 
and would therefore be 4.69% and 1.98% respectively.). 



in Vocational 
Schools, or Tak- 
ing Vocational 
Studies in Other 
Schools, (not in- 
cluding those in 
Reformatories or 
Institutions for 
Defectives.) 

I 557,576 I 

3.9% 
46 



Number Completing 
Courses. 



1.59% 



3—278,788 



Notes on Recent Educational 
Literature 

By WiUiam Kent* 



In recent years there has been an enormous prockiction of all 
kinds of educational literature. No one can be expected to read 
any mere than a small fraction of it. Much of it is only of 
local or temporary interest. There is evidence, however, of 
an important change in the character of educational literature 
of the higher class. The authors of it are not content as in 
the past merely to voice their sentiments of praise or blame for 
existing systems, but are pointing out definitely the direction 
in which progress should be made and details of the methods 
by which reforms may be accomplished. The belief has long 
been common that our whole educational system needs a care- 
ful review and reform, but these beliefs appear now to be 
crystalizing into plans, and the results are apparent in the or- 
ganization of societies for promoting educational reforms and 
in the acts of various state legislatures looking to educational 
progress. The trend of modern thought concerning education- 
al reforms will appear in the following notes taken from vari- 
ous recent publications : 

The U. S. Bureau of Education. 

Vol. 1 of the Report of the U. S. Commissioner of Educa- 
tion for the year ending June 30, 1905, contains many valuable 
papers. Among them are Abstracts of the Report of the Mose- 
ly Educational Commission, pages 1 to 39; The teaching of 
Agriculture in the Schools of France and Belgium, pages 87 
to 96 ; Higher Education for Business Men in the United 
States and Germany, from the report of Dr. Jastrow of Ber- 
lin University, pages 97 to 110. 

The American Method of getting a Business Education is 
explained by Dr. Jastrow in the following interesting 
paragraph : 



* Dean and Professor of Mechanical Engineering in the L. C. Smith College of Applied 
Science, Syracuse University. 

47 



"When I asked how a young man who had just entered a 
business acquired the practical business knowledge requisite to 
a successful career, if there was no one whose duty it was to 
give him instruction, the stereotyped reply was : 'Oh, he 
must pick it up.' This 'picking it up' is, indeed, the great 
secret of American life, to unravel which a brief sojourn of 
only three months does not suffice. I can not, however, ab- 
stain from mentioning what a gentleman replied to me, who, 
though not a merchant himself, is in a position where he has 
many opportunities to acquire a knowledge of commercial life : 
'You do not understand how young people learn the mercan- 
tile profession without special instruction? The case is very 
simple. They never do learn it. It is a pity to see how 
thousands enter this calling and go to the bottom and 
how it depends on mere accident whether or not a young man 
acquires, during the first few years, the knowledge necessary 
for success in his career." 

Art Education an Important Factor in Industrial Develop- 
ment, by Halsey Cooley Ives, LL. D., Director of the St. Louis 
School and Museum of Arts and Director of the Departments 
of z\rts at the Universal Exhibitions at Chicago, 1893, and St. 
Louis, 1904. Pages 155 to 183. Probably no more important 
paper on this subject has ever been published in this coun- 
try. It is a severe criticism on the American educational sys- 
tem for the poverty of its training in art. The following is an 
extract : 

"In the main, our schools have ignored or failed to bring 
within their sphere the broad and liberal application of art ; and 
in this they have slighted the applied arts, looked down upon 
the craftsman, neglected design, made technique their god. 
They have trained a multitude of eager students to only 
paint pictures, that few men want and fewer buy, and have 
elaborately equipped the great majority of those who flock 
to them for instruction to lead lives of want and uselessness. 
It was not so in the days of the Renaissance. It is not so in 
countries where art is broadly and properly taught, and it 
ought not to be so here. With the crying need for reform 
the present conditions cannot last, and a remedy will be 
applied. 

What is needed is not so much more art schools as more 
art in our common schools. One of the faults in our art educa- 
tional work is in not beginning its influence early enough in 
the training of our people. We can have no real foundation 
for art appreciation until one generation of school children 
shall have had a course of art instruction, continued from the 

48 



day of beginning the work in a kindergarten until graduating 
from the grammar or high school." 

Instruction in Forestry, pages 237 to 244. Five State uni- 
versities are now offering four-year courses in forestry, viz : 
Iowa, Maine, Minnesota, Nebraska, Ohio; and Michigan Ag- 
ricultural college, Yale University, and the University of Michi" 
gan have graduate courses. 

The American System of Agricultural and Research, by 
A. C. True, Director, Office of Experiment Stations, U. S. 
Department of Agriculture, pages 244 to 255. This article 
is chiefly historical and descriptive. It is interesting to note 
that some progress has been made in agricultural instruction in 
secondary and primary schools, some of which are supported 
by state or local funds. Alabama has nine such schools, one 
in each Congressional district. In Connecticut there is a school 
of Horticulture, just outside of the City of Hartford. In 
Massachusetts, an agricultural course has been established in 
the Mt. Hermon School, near Northfield. At Groton there is 
a school of horticulture and landscape gardening for women. 
Simmons college, Boston, provides a course of theoretical and 
practical horticulture for women. Wellesley college also an- 
nounces a course in elementary horticulture and landscape 
gardening. In Missouri the three state normal schools give 
instruction in agriculture for the purpose of preparing teachers 
to introduce this subject in the public schools of the State. 
Several other agricultural schools of secondary grades are men- 
tioned. The State Legislatures of Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, 
Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina and 
Wisconsin have recently passed laws whereby the public 
schools are permitted or encouraged to provide instruction in 
agriculture. 

Progress of Education and Reform in China, pages 256 to 
265, by E. T. Williams, Chinese Secretary of the American 
Legation at Peking. China is vmdergoing an educational 
revolution. A large number of students are sent abroad for 
education, most of them to Japan, though several hundreds 
have been sent to Europe and America. 

The American School System in Porto Rico, pages 293 to 
344. Satisfactory progress is being made in the introduction 
of American methods, but the work is suffering for the lack of 
funds. 

Education in the Philippines, pages 345 to 364. The schools 
have long passed the experimental stage. "It is certain now 
that they must continue to increase in efficiency and numbers 
until they are performing their whole duty toward the up- 
lifting of the Filipino people." 

49 



New York State Bureau of Education. 

The report of the New York State Bureau of Education for 
the year 1907 contains some interesting matter. The compul- 
sory education law is being enforced more effectually than 
formerly. The result is shown in the fact that the percentage 
of daily attendance to enrollment has increased from 65 per 
cent, in 1896 to 76.3 in 1906. The report says : 

"During the year, the compulsory education law has been 
administered with firmness and uniform stadiness in every sec- 
tion of the State, and while it must be conceded that many 
children have not been in school at all, and many others very 
irregularly, yet substantial gains have been made in attend- 
ance at the schools over previous years. 

In the enforcement of these laws, the problem of child labor 
blocks the way beyond all others. On the one side, the manu- 
facturer, the merchant, the farmer, seem, as never before in 
our history, bent on employing cheap labor, or that which 
seems cheap. * * * * 

On the other hand is the parent, who apparently places the 
dollar above the child. * * * * 

Authorities charged with the enforcement of these laws, in- 
cluding the courts, too often lose sight of the rights of the child 
by showing unwarranted consideration for the parent, where- 
as the law was enacted by the Legislature to promote the per- 
manent well being of the child rather than the temporary in- 
terests of the parent. * * =i= *" 

The work of the elementary department is not entirely sat- 
isfactory. 

'"•' * * * while gratifying progress is indicated in some 
departments of the elementary field, there does not seem to 
be as marked improvement in other directions as there ought to 
be or as we should have reason to expect. Work in the funda- 
mentals of education, especially in reading, writing and spell- 
ing, use of English, both oral and written, and oral work in 
arithmetic (mental arithmetic) in simple computations and 
analysis of problems is not as a rule satisfactory. This seems 
to be peculiarly the case in grades 4 to 7 inclusive. In explan- 
ation it may be said that in these grades the teachers are more 
frequently weak, inexperienced or inefficient than elsewhere. 

The report does not explain why these teachers are inef- 
ficient or whether any steps are to be taken by the Department 
to increase their efficiency. It is well, however, that the De- 
partment recognizes the facts ; the remedies may come later. 

50 



The report shows some astonishing statistics of the pubHc 
schools of the state : 

Year . 1886 1896 1906 

?-^.?ts;r^.!^^°°'11;i;S lilt iii 

Average daily attendance .. 625,813 /72,UM l,Ui»,^5-. 
While in 20 years the school attendance has increased about 
60 per cent., the total wages paid to teachers have increased 300 
per cent, and the total cost of manitanimg schools 400 per 
cent This does not mean that education is costing too much 
now but only that we were in the dark ages 20 years ago. 
The country is rich enough to educate its people as they should 
be educated and the people are more and more appreciating 
the necessity for higher education The ""'^^b^^' ^^^^-h schod 
in the State has increased from 421 in 1896 to 668 in 1906. 

In regard to the condition of education m New York State, 
Dr Andrew S. Draper, State Commissioner of Education, in 
an address before the New York State Federation of Women s 
Clubs, Oct. 30, 1907, says, "The percentage of illiteracy m the 
State of New York is many times greater than m Great Britain 
or France or the German Empire or Switzerland or Scandi- 
navia or Japan. Anvthing that vou will do to support or force 
school officers to exact a complete attendance of all children 
of school age will be a substantial public service. If they re- 
fuse after their attention is called to a specific case, you may be 
sure of help from the Attendance Division of the State De- 
partment." 

From addresses by Commissioner Draper, published by the 
N. Y. State Education Department, 1906: 

"There is a large demand for training in the chemistry 
which enters into agricultural and manufacturing activities, 
in all lines of eneineering. in the economics of productivity 
and trade, and in the technic of all the businesses which follow 

after them." Page 97. , ,. r • .u a fi.of 

"It is developing a rather common belief m the crowd that 
voung people must be trained for subordinate places m busi- 
ness and for manual skill in the trades as well as for the col- 
leges and for positions claiming deep sf^entific knowledge 
that the high schools have not yet accomplished all they ought 
in this direction; that there is something lacking in the way of 
training the masses of children in the elementary schools for 
efficiency and contenment in the situations m life which they 
are likely to occupy ; that something in the way of public trade 

51 



schools must be established for the children of the masses at a 
rather early age, and that the universities and colleges are 
called upon to recognize that fact and help realize it. In a 
word, the very development of the higher learning is creating 
the common thought that more must be done for the ele- 
mentary learning, that not so much is being done for those who 
do not go to college as for those who do, and that more must 
be done to adapt the training of the masses to probable en- 
vironment and to the inevitable conditions of hand labor and 
other self-respecting and useful employments." Page 98. 

Commissioner Draper has continued his study of the subject 
of industrial education and in a notable address entitled, "Our 
Children, Our Schools and Our Industries," delivered at the 
meeting of the Associated Principals of the State of New 
York, held at Syracuse, December 27th, 1907, he took ad- 
vanced ground in favor of the addition of industrial or trade 
education to the public school system. His address has been 
published in pamphlet form by the Bureau of Education. The 
following are some extracts from it : 

"It seems clear enough that we are about to have a new class 
of schools in our system of public education. Provision must 
be made for schools which teach trades and also for schools 
of a more general character for those v/ho leave the elementary 
grades to work in the stores and offices and factories. The 
school age must be extended, and the schools must keep hold 
of children until they are fitted to begin some definite employ- 
ment. The public school system must support the industrial as 
well as the professional activities of the country. 

"Not more than one-third of the children who enter the ele- 
mentary schools in the cities of this state remain to complete 
the course. Only about one-half of them remain till the end of 
the fifth grade. The greater number drop out in the middle 
of the course because parents are indifferent, because the 
schools do not fit the child for definite work, because of the pub- 
lic indifference to attendance laws, because the age at which the 
law lets them leave the school is reached before the simple work 
of the school is done, and because the work of the schools 
is not up to the ages of the pupils. 

"There is very little in the school system which makes for 
ambition and skill in work with the hands. There is much 
in it which makes for inefficiency and for misfits between 
adaptation to work and opportunity in life. We are alarm- 
ingly profligate of boys and girls. 

"In the last twenty-five years the German exports of manu- 
factured goods have increased more rapidly than those of 
the United States, notwithstanding our marvellous growth 
in population and in territory occupied. 

52 



*'The old system of apprenticeship has disappeared from 
this country. The corporation is too intent upon dividends 
to be bothered with boys who are not content to become a 
mere part of the machine, and the labor organization is ap- 
prehensive about the effect of more workmen upon the scale 
of wages. We have come to the point where it is manifest 
enough that if millions of American boys and girls are to have 
their fair chance we must establish new public policies to give 
it to them ; if anything like a desirable number are to be- 
come good workmen, the schools must train them for it. 

"My suggestions and my tentative plan may perhaps be 
stated as follows : 

1. Insist upon more complete and always up-to-date vital 
statistics. Know of the existence of every child, and when he 
is of school age have him accounted for. 

2. Require attendance at seven years of age, instead of 
eight, and let it continue, in elementary school or trade 
school, to seventeen, but excuse from attendance before eight, 
at the parents' request, on the ground of immaturity, and also 
excuse from attendance whenever the work in the elementary 
school and trade school is completed, or after fifteen if the 
child is regularly at work. 

3 Establish schools for teaching trade vocations, the work 
to begin at the end of the elementary course, and continue for 
three years. 

4. Let the trades schools be open both in the day time and 
evening. 

5. Establish continuation schools, to be open mainly in the 
evenings, where the work shall be of a general character, suit- 
ed to the needs of youth who are employed through the day and 
are not doing the work in the trades schools. In other words, 
make our evening schools more general and better. Let the 
work in the continuation schools go perhaps half way or more 
through the high school course, but with less formalism about 
it. 

6. Shorten the time in the elementary schools to seven 
years. Take out what is not vital for a child to know in order 
to learn or to do things on his own account if he has the 
power. Strive to give him power, and expect that through it 
he will get knowledge. Stop reasoning that mere information 
will give him power. Stop the dress parade and pretence 
about teaching, which consume time unnecessarily. Push the 
child along and aim to have him finish the elementary school 
in his fourteenth year. When he is fifteen send him to the 
trades school whether he has finished the elementary school 
or not. 

53 



7 Assume that if the child does not go to the high school, 
his school work may end with his seventeenth year, and not in 
his fourteenth year. 

8. Put into the elementary schools, from the very begin- 
ning, some phase of industrial work. Up to the last year or 
two let it be work that can be done in the schoolroom, at 
the desks, under the ordinary teachers, and will occupy two 
or three hours a week. This might proceed from folding 
paper, molding sand, modeling clay, outlining with a needle, 
to the simple knife work in wood, plain sewing, knitting, and 
the like. In the last year or two send the classes to central 
rooms specially prepared, perhaps to the trades schools, for 
more complex wood work, cooking, etc. Always emphasize 
the drawing. 

9. As the child comes to the end of the elementary schools, 
expect him to elect whether he will go to the high school, to a 
trades school, or to work. 

10 Wherever he goes, expect that the schools will keep 
track of him until he is at least seventeen. If he goes to the 
trades school, expect him to get into the possession of the 
fundamental knowledge and something of the skill of a trade 
by his seventeenth or eighteenth year. If he goes to work in a 
store or factory, expect him to come to the continuation 
school till his seventeenth year is completed. Have him and 
his parents understand that he is responsible to the schools 
until he is perhaps eighteen years old. 

11. Set up trades schools in spacious, but not necessarily 
ornate, buildings. Start the particular kind of trades schools 
that the business of the town and the interests of the trades 
call for. Let it be understood that wherever there is a suf- 
ficient number of children to learn a particular trade, there wilt 
be a school to teach it to them. Let the trades school partake 
more of the character of the shop than of the school. Hold to 
books, somewhat, particularly books which the pupils will 
be glad to read by themselves, carry mathmetics a little far- 
ther, lay emphasis upon work with a pencil ; let the main part 
of the work be with the hands ; and let the atmosphere of the 
place be free and comfortable, so that young people will like 
it. Let the teaching be done by real artisans, who are intellect- 
ually balanced and can teach, rather than by teachers who can 
use tools only indifferently. Above all, have teachers who are 
not afraid of youth, and so are not under the necessity of 
brow-beating and badgering them a great deal, but rather who 
command respect because of what they are, and can lead the 
way to the pleasure of really doing things. 

54 



12. Keep the trades schools open afternoons and evenmgs. 
Have their pupils attend from four to five hours to as many- 
hours a week as the pupil can g^ive. Let the training be in- 
dividual and let the progress of the pupil depend upon him- 
self and upon the time he can give ; but allow him to engage 
in other work for pay if he must. 

13. Modify the child labor laws so they will articulate with 
the plan, and enforce them. Require employers to regulate 
their affairs so that employees may attend continuation schools 
or a trades school at least four or five hours per week. 

14. Let the trades schools be supported by the town, but 
give them sufficient state aid to encourage their organization 
and dispose them to conform to the needs of the situation. 

15. Meet any demand on behalf of girls as well as on be- 
half of boys. 

16. Make it cjuite possible for one in a trades school to go 
to a manual training high school, and vice versa, but be care- 
ful to avoid the inference that one is to prepare for another. 
Let it be understood that each stands upon its own footing and 
leads to very different ends. 

"Of course all this is tentative. It is all to be thrashed out 
in discussion and worked out in experience. We are breaking 
out new thoroughfares. It must not be overlooked that we 
have exploited the fundamental principles of our democracy 
in our politics and in our religion much more completely than 
in our education or in our industries. The application of these 
principles to our training and our work is now to be pressed 
to conclusions. When we do that, and not before, we shall 
assure the free American chance to every one and we shall 
give a new interpretation and a new power to be essential 
factors of our common life." 

The Massachusetts Commission of 1905. 

Probably the most important educational paper that has ap- 
peared in many years is the Report of the Massachusetts Com- 
mission of Industrial and Technical Education, April, 1906. It 
is reprinted by the Teachers' College, Columbia University, 
New York, in a pamphlet of 196 pages. It contains a report 
of the preliminary Commission, appointed in 1905, under in- 
structions to investigate the needs for education in the different 
grades of skill and responsibility in the various industries of 
the commonwealth, to investigate how far the needs are met 
by existing conditions and to consider what new forms of 
educational effort may be advisable. Fifteen thousand dol- 
lars was appropriated for the work of the committee, twenty 

55 



public hearings were, given in different cities, and the re- 
port is full of the results of these investigations. 
Following are some extracts from this report : 
The commission was made aware of the growing feeling of 
inadequacy of the existing public school system to meet fully 
the needs of modern industrial and social conditions. The 
opinion was expressed by many speakers that the schools are 
too exclusively literary in their spirit, scope and methods. 
(Pages.) 

For the great majority of children who leave school to enter 
employments at the age of 14 or 15, the first three or four years 
are practically waste years, so far as the actual productive 
value of the child is concerned, and so far as increasing 
his industrial or productive efficiency. The employments up- 
on which they enter demand so little intelligence and so little 
manual skill that they are not educative in any sense. (Page 
18.) 

There seem to be two lines in which industrial education 
may be developed — through the existing public school system, 
and through independent industrial schools. In regard to the 
former, the commission recommends that cities and towns so 
modify the work in the elementary schools as to include for 
boys and girls instruction and practice in the elements of 
productive industry, including agriculture, and the mechanic 
and domestic arts, and that this instruction be of such a 
character as to secure from it the highest culture as well 
as the highest industrial value ; and that the work in the 
high schools be modified so that the instruction in mathematics, 
the sciences and drawing shall show the application and use 
of these subjects in industrial life, with especial reference 
to local industries, so that the students may see that these 
subjects are not designed primarily and solely for academic 
purposes, but that they may be utilized for the purposes of 
practical life. That is algebra and geometry should bo so 
taught in the public schools as to show their relations to con- 
struction ; botany to horticulture and agriculture ; chemistry to 
agriculture, manufactures and domestic sciences; and draw- 
ing to every form of industry. (Page 20.) 

The Commission would also recommend that all towns and 
cities provides by new elective industrial courses in high 
schools instruction in the principles of agriculture and the do- 
mestic and mechanic arts ; that in addition to day courses, 
cities and towns provide evening courses for persons already 
employed in trades ; and that provision be made for the instruc- 
tion in part-time day classes of children between the ages of 
14 and 18 years who may be employed during the remainder 

56 



of the day, to the end that instruction in the principles and 
the practice in the arts may go on together. (Page 21.) 

The Commission submits for the consideration of the Legis- 
lature a draft of a bill embodying its recommendations for 
the appointment of a Commission on Industrial Education 
consisting of five persons to serve for five years and specify 
ing the duties of such a Commission. (Page 21.) 

The Commission believes that the elements of industrial 
training, agriculture, domestic and mechanical sciences 
should be taught in the public school, and, as already stated, 
that there should be, in addition to this elementary teaching, 
distinctive industrial schools separated entirely from the 
public school system. (Page 23.) 

It has been said that the years from 14 to 16 are the "wasted 
years" of the child's life. The application was made to the 
child who enters upon his industrial career at such an age, 
and when we find that 25,000 of the children of the State of 
Massachusetts are at work or idle at those ages, we are led 
to believe that THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT QUES- 
TION WHICH FACES THE EDUCATIONAL WORLD 
TODAY. 

The State releases the child from its educational authority at 
fourteen, and the child who is no longer interested in the in- 
active school life, or who feels the stress of necessity for self- 
support, is forced to search for an opportunity to fit himself 
for industrial responsibilities. What awaits him? No schools 
exist which ofifer practical training until he at least is sixteen or 
eighteen and even then they are few in number and usually 
at a great distance from the child's home. He must turn to 
the "practical school of life" and seek employment, only to 
find that the doors of those industries which would afiford him 
an opportunity "to pick up a trade" are not open to him until 
he is sixteen, or usually eighteen years of age, while very few 
of the so-called apprenticeships receive him under eighteen. 
Even in the unskilled industries of the better class, proprietors 
are becoming more and more averse to the employment of the 
younger child. The result is that he drifts into an unskilled 
industry, or into one which is undesirable in character. (Page 
25.) 

This investigation has been conducted in 43 of the cities 
and towns of the State, in every section of the State, and 
has followed 5,459 children into 3,157 homes and into 354 
establishments, representing 55 industries. (Page 26.) 

Five-sixths of the children in the cotton mills have not 
graduated from the grammar schools, and a very large pro- 
portion have not completed the seventh grade, while practi- 

57 



cally none of the children have had high school training. All 
of these children are by no means from the poorest homes; 
in fact, there are twice as many in what we have classed as 
good-grade families as there are in the second grade. Neither 
is the appreciation of education of low grade. Forty per 
cent, of these families have shown a decided interest in a school 
which would give their children wage earning powers, and 
have declared they wanted their children to remain in school ; 
and, what is more tragic, 66 per cent, of them could have 
kept them there. (Page 44.) 

Neither power nor advantage is gained by entering the in- 
dustry at an early age ; the child who does enter closes behind 
him the door to progress to a fair living wage ; that child as- 
sociates himself with our most undesirable population ; the 
work performed by children is passing gradually to poorer and 
poorer classes of foreigners. The State should not insist on 
keeping all of its children in ignorance to support industries 
in which industrial education is of little value. (Page 45.) 

The pathetic moment is not when the child leaves school, 
but when, having been at work, he is thrown out by "slack 
times," or "quits work" because he does not like it. He will 
not return to school, and he cannot find a chance to learn a 
trade. There are plenty of opportunities for the older boy with 
education, but this one must drift yet a year or two, if not 
longer, or always, and be content with unskilled labor. Sixty- 
eight per cent, of those found at work under sixteen are in 
the unskilled industries and the textile mills, as opposed to 9 
per cent, in the high-grade skilled industries, and 22 per cent, 
in the low-grade skilled industries, outside of the woolen mills. 
(Page 86.) 

Out of 35 or 40 superintendents interviewed in all sections 
of the State, all except 3 are of the opinion that the great 
lack is in the system, which fails to offer the child of four- 
teen continued schooling of a practical character, introduced 
and maintained by a central authority, especially qualified to 
know what should be done and hovv' to do it, as local powers 
could not. (Page 87.) 

Department stores and errand positions do not afford a 
living wage, and offer no opportunity for advancement to 
one. They are distinctly bad in influence, since the younger 
employee is so shifting, resulting in instability of character. 
When the child has reached sixteen or seventeen, he or she 
must begin again at the bottom. 

Sixty-eight per cent, of the children who commence work 
between fourteen and sixteen are subjected to the evil in- 
fluences of these unskilled industries or are in mills. They 

58 



have wasted the years as far as industrial development is con- 
cerned, and in many cases they have forfeited the chance ever 
to secure it, because of lack of education. (Page 88.) 

The tendency is to feel that the employment of children is 
a great disadvantage. The low-grade industries are taking 
children less and less ; even the woolen mills are employing 
fewer children than heretofore. The result is that children 
are forced more and more into juvenile employments or the 
lower industries, Out of 272 employers who expressed an opin- 
ion, 193, or 70 per cent, declared it was no advantage to the 
industry to employ children under sixteen. 

Another strong and growing tendency is to demand experi- 
enced help, and to refuse all apprentices and younger help. 
Eighty per cent, of employers declare they do not want chil- 
dren under sixteen, and 30 per cent, put the minimum age at 
eighteen. 

It is certainly a problem as to where the next generation of 
skilled workers is to come from. Employer after employer 
refuses to teach, and union after union limits the number of ap- 
prentices. Both seem to say to the boy, "Not wanted here." 
{Page 89.) 

The investigation work of Massachusetts has been done 
for the whole country. What is true in Massachusetts is un- 
doubtedly true in other states. What is now need is not fur- 
ther investigation but legislative action. 

The Massachusetts Commission of J 906* 

Report of the Massachussets Commission of Industrial Edu- 
cation, March, 1907, Public Document, No. 76. The Commis- 
sion appointed in 1905 recommended that a new Commission 
be appointed to establish schools in co-operation with the local 
authorities throughout the State. A bill for this purpose was 
passed in January, 1906, and the present pamphlet is the first 
report of the new Commission. 

The act provides, among other things, that the Com- 
mission may initiate and superintend the establishment and 
maintenance of industrial schools for boys and girls in vari- 
ous centers of the commonwealth, with the co-operation and 
consent of the municipality involved, or the municipality con- 
stituent of any district to be formed by the union of towns 
and cities as hereinafter provided. The Commission shall 
have all necessary powers in the conduct and maintenance of 
industrial schools, and money appropriated by the State and 
municipality for their maintenance shall be expended under 
its direction. 

59 



Section 3. All cities and town may provide independent in- 
dustrial schools for instruction in the principles of agriculture 
and the domestic and mechanic arts, but attendance upon such 
schools of children under fourteen years of age shall not take 
the place of attendance upon public schools as required by 
law. In addition to these industrial schools, cities and towns 
may provide for evening courses for persons already employed 
in trades, and they may also provide, in the industrial schools 
and the evening schools herein authorized, for the instruction 
of in part-time classes of children between the ages of four- 
teen and eighteen years who may be employed during the re- 
mainder of the day, to the end that instruction in the prin- 
ciples and the practice of the arts may go on together. (Page 
8.) 

Following are a few extracts from the report: 

"In general, the concisions reached by the preliminary com- 
mission, as a result of its various inquiries, including an im- 
portant special investigation into the problem of what be- 
comes of the mass of boys and girls during the three or four 
years after they leave the grammar school, may be said to 
mark an epoch in educational progress not only in Massachu- 
setts but for the country as a whole." (Page 13.) 

"Boys are not wanted in most of the skilled industries un- 
til they are sixteen years of age. The total result is a great 
number of boys and girls from fourteen to sixteen years of 
age, most of whom are at work in various kinds of juvenile 
occupation, in which they learn no trade, are subject to little 
if any beneficial general education, and often too much harm- 
ful education from shifting experience and environment. 
Large numbers of these children would be in school if the 
school promised preparation for some life pursuit. These 
years are of little economic value to such children, and there 
is little increase in the economic value of most of them as time 
goes on. Hence, these are at present wasted years — lost to 
the children because of the lack of economic growth, and to 
the industries because the children are not fitted to satisfy the 
demand for trained workers by the time they are old enough 
to be employed in the trades. 

"These years and the subsequent years are, however, valu- 
able for industrial education ; but there is at present no agency 
whereby this education is provided, save here and there to a 
limited extent only, and then chiefly by philanthropy. 

"Hence the need of industrial schools to supplement the ex- 
isting school system, and to meet a new educational need 
which has developed with the evolution of our industries and 
commerce." (Page 16.) 

60 



''With a view to securing a full expression of the public 
mind with reference to the establishing of industrial schools in 
the commonwealth, the Commission has held public meetings 
and informal conferences in several of the principal cities and 
mill tow'US of the State, in which the plans and purposes of the 
proposed schools have been discussed by men representing all 
the various interest of the community." 

"The result of these conferences and meetings confirms the 
Commission in the belief that the people of the State as a 
whole are ready to co-operate in substantial ways with the 
Legislature in the gradual experimental building up of a sys- 
tem of vocational training of the new generation which in 
a few years begin to make up the industrial force of the com- 
monwealth." (Page 18.) 

"The members of the Commission are unanimous in the be- 
lief that all that is vital and essential to a proper scheme of in- 
dustrial education for Massachusetts can be and will be 
brought about not only without opposition on the part of or- 
ganized labor, but in many cases with the active and interest- 
ed co-operation of its representatives. (Page 19.) 

"It is the belief of the Commission that agriculture must 
be developed in Massachusetts on a plan different from the 
one so successfully followed in our Western States. Here 
our farming must be intensive, instead of extensive, as in the 
West. It is hoped that a typical agricultural school may be 
established before the next annual report." (Page 20.) 

Action in regard to industrial education has been taken in 
various cities and towns. (Page 23.) 

"The Fitchburg Committtee, composed of employers, em- 
ployees, representatives of labor unions and business men, 
have requested an appropriation from the city government, 
with a view to establishing a day school for fifty boys and 
twenty-five girls." 

"The Worcester Education Association has taken the lead, 
and the city government has been requested to appoint a com- 
mittee to co-operate with this Commsision in the establish- 
ment of a school." 

"In Pittsfield two new school buildings are proposed, and 
it is likely one of them may be used as an industrial school. 
A committee has been appointed, w'hich now has the question 
in hand, and favorable results are expected." 

"In North Attleborough and Attleborough conference com- 
mittees have been appointed, with a view to the establishment 
of a school of jewelry and silverware design." 

"In LawTcnce, the Central Labor L^nion and the Board of 

61 



Trade have appointed committees of conference, with the view 
to the establishment of a school at no distant date." 

"The city government of Northampton has appointed a 
committee with power to represent the city in the establish- 
ment by this Commission of an agricultural school." 

"The city government of North Adams has passed to its 
second reading an appropriation of $7,500 for the establish- 
ment of an evening industrial school." 

"The last Commission found that there are at least twenty- 
five thousand boys and girls in Massachusetts, between the 
age of fourteen and sixteen, who are now in various kinds 
of juvenile employments, or who are idle ; and that these young 
people who enter the juvenile employments earn very little 
at the start, and increase their earning capacity but little as 
the years go on, so that by the time they are eighteen, or nine- 
teen or twenty, they are able to earn little mor than they had 
earned when they were much younger ; and that at eighteen 
or nineteen a very large proportion of them have arrived at 
almost the maximum of their earning capacity. Now, the 
Commission, of course, desires to prevent this waste, and is 
especially desirous of securing for these young people a career 
in a trade which will insure them a steady job, and, if they 
are the right kind of workers, an increasing wage." (Page 
29.) 

"Since 1900 the city of Munich has gradually been trans- 
forming its 'continuation schools' for elementary school gradu- 
ates (corresponding to our grammar school graduates) into 
elementary technical schools for apprentices in the trades and 
in business. The city now maintains forty different kinds of 
these schools. In 1900, were opened schools for butchers, bak- 
ers, shoemakers, chimney sweeps and barbers; in 1901. for 
wood turners, glaziers, gardeners, confectioners, wagon mak- 
ers and blacksmiths, tailors, photographers, interior decorators, 
painters' materials; in 1902, for hotel and restaurant waiters, 
coachmen, painters, paper hangers, bookbinders, potters and 
stove setters, watchmakers, clockmakers, jewelers, goldsmiths 
and silversmiths ; in 1903, for foundrymen, pewterers, copper- 
smiths, tinsmiths and plumbers, stucco workers and marble cut- 
ters, wood carvers, coopers, saddlers, and leather workers; 
and in 1905, for business apprentices, printers and type set- 
ters, lithographers and engravers, building iron and orna- 
mental iron workers, machine makers, mechanics, cabinet mak- 
ers, masons and stone cutters, carpenters." (Page 46.) 

"Certain conclusions suggest themselves as a result of a 
study of these schools, namely : — 

"1. They solve the problem of how to keep under appro- 

62 



priate educational influence during their period of adolescence 
that great body of youth who are obliged to leave school when 
only thirteen or fourteen years old. 

"2. There is in them complete utilization of educational op- 
portunity by the pupils. There is no economic or educational 
waste. Attendance being compulsory, punctuality and reg- 
ularity of attendance are assurred." 

"7. The schools embody a well-defined policy that underlies 
all forms of activity in Germany ; namely, that every efficient 
worker, whether in trade, business or professsion, requires gen- 
eral education, and also technical preparation, for the particular 
work he is to do." (Page 51.) 

Industrial Education in Different Cities. 

In the report of the Massachusetts Commission are given 
the names of many cities and towns in that State w^hich are 
taking action in regard to establishing schools of trades. 
Professor Sweet's paper mentions several of the most import- 
ant trade schools already established in different parts of the 
country. It is worthy of note that the Milwaukee School of 
Trades, which teaches pattern making, molding, core-making, 
and foundry practice ; the machinist's trade, including tool- 
making ; and plumbing and gas fitting ; and which was found- 
ed and carried on as a private institution by public spirited citi- 
zens of Milwaukee, has recently, under provision of a law of 
the State, been added to the public school system of the city. 

According to a recent press item, "The Cleveland branch 
of the National Metal Trades Association is offering to co- 
operate with the Board of Education in the city of Cleveland 
in the establishment of trade schools. The association has 
asked the school officials to provide for the appointment of a 
committee representing the Builders' Exchange, the Chamber 
of Commerce, the United Trades and Labor Council, the Metal 
Trades Association, the Y. M. C. A., the Case School of Ap- 
plied Science, and other institutions, with a view of discuss- 
ing the adoption of the best curriculum for the new Cleve- 
land Technical High school. The association states that there 
is a constantly growing scarcity of skilled labor in the various 
trades ovv^ng to the lack of education." 

A press dispatch, dated Albany, Nov. 22, 1907, says, "In- 
dustrial education in the elementary schools with an eye to pre- 
paration for the industrial trades has been adopted as a policy 
by the educational authorities of the city of Albany. * * * * 
The Board of Education has asked, and the Board of Estimate 
has now allowed, an initial appropriation with which to make 

63 



a beginning in one school. The plan is to establish eventually 
several elementary industrial schools in various parts of the 
city with an industrial High school to crown the system.**** 

The school in which the initial experiment is to be tried is 
already equipped. Woodworking is to be instituted first, with 
a cooking laboratory to aid in the teaching of cooking, prin- 
ciples of diet, home nursing and the like. Eventually this 
equipment will be augmented by apparatus for metal work- 
ing, forging, molding and casting. 

The courses in industrial training are to be elective to pupils 
14 years old who have completed the fifth school year. 

While shop work for boys and the domestic arts for girls 
will constitute the first industrial courses to be introduced, 
these are regarded as only the first steps in a comprehensive 
programme covering all of the leading industries of this section. 

The Philadelphia Municipal Trade School. 

A resolution providing for a trade school was passed by the 
Board of Education in Philadelphia during the year 1906 and 
a building at corner Twelfth and Locust streets, formerly 
occupied as a public school, was comverted and equipped with 
all the necessary appliances for practical administration and 
instruction. The several trades were kept entirely separate, 
with instructors of well known practical ability for each branch. 
The school opened in October, 1906, and so quickly did its 
reputation spread that in May, 1907, 481 young men were en- 
rolled and receiving instruction in the various branches of 
trade. The following is a list of the thirteen classes now 
organized with the number of pupils in each class. 

Plumbing, 45; pipe-fitting, 13; blacksmithing, 11; sheet 
metal work, 51; electrical construction, 126; bricklaying, 37; 
pattern-making, 28 ; house and sign painting, 33 ; architectural 
drawing, 34; mechanical drawing, 21; carpentry, 45; plaster- 
ing, 33. 

There are thirteen teachers, one to each class, besides five 
assistants for the larger classes. Prof. William Odenatt, 
mechanical engineer, is Superintendent. (From an article in 
Domestic Bngineering, May 4, 1907.) 

Decay of the Apprenticeship System. 

The Report of President Seabrook of the National Associ- 
ation of Master Sheet Metal Workers, read at the convention 
at Indianapolis, August, 1906, contains the following: 

The old-time apprenticeship in the sheet metal trades, in 
most instances, has ceased for several years. In very few cases 

64 



is any attempt made to give an apprentice a knowledge of the 
sheet metal trade, nor has there been for quite a number of 
years. Instead of apprentices, a floating class called "help- 
ers" has been employed. These go from one shop to another 
for a year or two and then class themselves as journeymen. 
Consequently there is and has been for some time a dearth of 
good mechanics. The employer is largely to blame for this 
condition. If the future is to have good mechanics there must 
be a proper training of the boy in the present day. The slip- 
shod method of training that has been sown for several years 
past is being reaped today in slip-shod mechanics. * * * * 
Very few cities report any effort being made for a systematic 
training. Boston frankly says it has no apprentices. Think 
of it! Where are the mechanics for Boston ten years hence 
to come from? Worcester, Mass., says there is not an ap- 
prentice in the place. Kalamazoo, Mich., says they don't stay 
long enough with one employer to learn anything. Pittsburg, 
Pa., uses the apprentice where he will make the most money 
for the employer. Findlay. Ohio, has none — too expensive. 
The lack of apprentices or of any effort for their proper train- 
ing is the rule and not the exception. 

President Roosevelt on Agfficultural Schools. 

At a recent farmers' convention held in Syracuse, October 
23, a letter from President Roosevelt to Mr. Stilwell, President 
of the Chamber, was read, in which are found the following- 
paragraphs relating to agricultural education : 

I am firmly convinced that most farmers' boys and girls 
should be educated through agricultural high schools and 
through the teaching of practical elementary agriculture in the 
rural common schools, so that when grown up they shall be- 
come farmers and farmers' wives. 

Education should be towards and not away from the farm. 
There must be an organized effort to restore or create the high- 
est social conditions in the country districts, and the farmers' 
organizations should be strengthened so that they may best 
tell for social and trade betterment. 

The chief instrumentalities in bringing this about must be 
the farmers themselves, in whose hands the ultimate solution 
of the problem lies, and whose agents and employes the vari- 
ous organizations. State and Federal, are. The grange, the 
farmers' clubs, the horticultural and dairy associations can do 
much. 

There must be help from without through the New York 
State Agricultural Department, the State agricultural colleges, 
the experiment stations, while the Chambers of Commerce and 

65 



like organizations in cities and towns should work to the same 
end. 

National Society for the Promotion of Industrial Education. 

The National Society for the promotion of Industrial Educa- 
tion was organized in 1906. Dr. Henry S. Pritchett, President 
of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is President of 
the Society. The Board of Managers consists of twenty-seven 
men and women who are recognized leaders in educational and 
industrial matters. The Society has issued four pamphlet bul- 
letins with the following titles : 

No. 1. Proceedings of the Organization Meetings, Jan., 
1907. 

No. 2. A Selected Bibliography on Industrial Education, 
July, 1907. 

No. 3. A Symposium on Industrial Education, Sept., 1907. 

No. 2. Industrial Education for Women, Oct., 1907. 

Copies of these bulletins may be obtained by addressing the 
Secretary, Charles R. Richards, Teachers' College, New York 
City. 

Those interested should apply for membership in the So- 
ciety, which costs only two dollars per annum. 

State Committees of the Society for the Promotion of Indus- 
trial Education have been organized in most of the States. A 
meeting of the Society is to be held in the Art Institute, Chi- 
cago. January 23 to 25, 1908. The following subjects are an- 
nounced for discussion: 

1. Industrial Education as an Essential Factor in Our Na- 
tional Prosperity. 

2. The Apprenticeship System as a Means of Promoting 
Industrial Efficiency. 

3. The Place of the Trade School in Industrial Education. 

4. The Wage Earner's Benefit from Industrial Education. 

5. The True Ideal of a Public School System That Aims to 
Benefit All. 

Trade Education in Germany. 

In an article on "The American and the German Peril," by 
Louis J. Magee, Engineering Magazine, 1906, he discusses the 
numerous and many sided systems of industrial education in 
Germany. The following extracts are important : 

"The ten universities of the Empire, (called technical high 
schools), enrolling over 17,000 students, are in close touch with 

66 



and a great help to the industries. In several cases they cul- 
tivate special branches with regard to local interests. For in- 
stance, the school in Dresden has a course for the technic of 
dyeing. The Aix-la-Chapelle school has courses in mining and 
metallurgy. Danzig includes marine engineering, of course, 
though Berlin stands very high in that department. Karlsruhe 
has a forestry department; and Munich an agricultural 
course. 

"A comparative novelty even for Germany is the "commerc- 
ial high school," a high-class business institute for instruction in 
finance, trade, and the business side of industry. The very lat- 
est advance in this direction is the Handels-Hochschule, com- 
mercial "high school," (remembering that this word is equival- 
ent to our "college" or "institute") to be opened next Autumn 
under the auspices of the Corporation of Berlin merchants. It 
will receive only those who have had their years of appren- 
ticeship in actual business and who are able to pass the exam- 
inations of the "one year service army volunteer." 

"It is not, however, so much in these two highest categories of 
education that we are likely to be surprised in our German ob- 
servations, but rather in the bewildering list of middle and 
lower schools. The most wonderful thing about these is their 
ingenious adaptability to all hours of the day, to all ages, oc- 
cupations, and grades of preparation. There are for instance 
scattered through Germany a number of private technical in- 
stitutes (called Technicum) for those whose preparation boes 
not fit them for higher engineering schools ; especially for cases 
in which the earlier years had to be passed in shop work for 
self-support. Then, too, the cities are establishing new "tech- 
nical middle-schools." It is everywhere evident that the Ger- 
mans are no longer satisfied with a few hundreds of famous 
scholars, a few thousands of professional men — and then a 
drop almost down to the "three Rs." They are wisely grad- 
ing off their material. They have many different standards as 
to what constitutes an educated man. Then they try for ninety- 
nine per cent, efficiency under whatever standard the subject 
may properly belong. Even housemaids, butlers, and chim- 
ney-sweeps may receive in special schools all the correct fun- 
damental preparation for their humble careers. The fact that 
a boy or girl has left the common schools and taken employ- 
ment, is by no means an indication that the school days are 
over; on the contrary, the day's occupation creates interest for 
the evening courses in the "continuation" schools. In some 
of the schools charges are made, others are free. Some are sup- 
ported by the State, some by the city, others by employers' 
guilds in various branches of business ; and others by private 

G7 



funds. Some of the schools receive support from all these 
sources." 

Mr. Magee gives the following list of schools in Berlin de- 
voted to the industries, with the number of students attending 
them: 

Municipal high continuation schools 16,420 

(Among these latter 2,006 business, and 6,981 
hand trade, apprentices.) 

These schools teach German, English, 
French, machine drawing, lettering, stenography, 
typewriting, commercial correspondence, book- 
keeping and allied branches, sewing-machine 
work, machine embroidery, tailoring, mending, 
ironing, cooking, etc. 
\ arious schools ; for deaf and dumb, blind, orphans, 

etc. ; also elementary training for Royal Theatre .... 892 

Two Municipal night trade schools 4,979 

including day courses for painters, cabinet-makers, 
modellers in clay and wax, electro-wiremen, etc. 

Builders trade 255 

Weaving school (107 day pupils and 239 Sundays 

and evenings 239 

Cabinet-makers (1,028 being apprentices) 1,385 

Specialist schools — for masons, carpenters, saddlers, 
painters, chimney-sweeps (79 pupils), barbers and 
hairdressers (540 pupils), glaziers, smiths, basket- 
makers, book binders, printers, gardeners, photogra- 
phers, tailors, potters, plumbers, paper-hangers, 

wagon-makers, etc 4,903 

Schools supported by guilds and associations, as, for 
instance, 6 commercial night schools established by 
the Corporation of Berlin Merchants ; also schools 
for house servants, tailors, housekeeping, women's 
handiwork, sewing, etc 4,359 

Total 39,516 

For comparison with these figures we have the following : 

Common schools and private lower schools 238,904 

Gymnasia, and others corresponding to our higher 
grammar, and high schools and lowest college 
classes 23,302 

It thus appears that the schools devoted to the industries 
have about 15 per cent, as many pupils as the lower common 
schools have and over 70 per cent, more attendance than the 

68 



gymnasia or high schools. If Syracuse were to be equipped 
with industrial schools in the «ame proportion as Berlin, our 
industrial schools would have an attendance 1 7-10 times as 
great as our high schools. 

The chart on the following page is taken from "Charitites 
and Commons," October 5, 1907. 

Criticism of the German System. (W.K.) 

The chief objection likely to be made of the system shown 
in the diagram is that it makes a division of the pupils at 10 
years of age. The American plan of giving the same kind of 
schooling to all children up to the age of 14 years is more in 
harmony with our democratic ideas. The German system re- 
vised to suit American ideas and needs would be something 
like the following: 

{with education continued in evening schools 
with education continued in half time schools 
Commercial or Industrial School, 
at 14 / 

between JHio-h ! ^ Industrial High School 

ISchooli "^^^' '^a^^i"g to Technical College 

) Liberal Arts Colleee 



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-K lO 



A Proposed Half-Time School for 
Office Boys. 

By William Kent 

Professor Sweet mentions briefly in his report that the 
manufacturers of Cincinnati have made an arrangement with 
the university in that city to have half-time apprentices. A 
description of the arrangement is found in Vol. 15 of the 
Proceedings of the Society for the Promotion of Engineering 
Education, just published. 

"This course is so planned that the students taking it work 
alternate weeks in the engineering college of the university 
and at the manufacturing shops of the city. Each class is 
divided into two sections alternating with each other, so that 
when one class is at the university the other one is at the shops. 
In this way the shops are always fully manned, and thus the 
manufacturers suffer no loss and practically no inconvenience 
by the system. First, the entrance requirements for this course 
are precisely the same as for the regular four-year course. 
Secondly, the university instruction under the cooperative 
plan is just as complete, thorough, broad and cultural as the 
four-year course." 

One day a few months ago the writer was in a large office 
building occupied by a large corporation in New York City, 
and while in company with the general manager, noticed in 
the main hall of each floor, near the elevators, two or three 
office boys sitting idly on benches, awaiting calls to run errands. 
In answer to his comment on the fact that the boys looked 
unusually bright and clean, the manager said, "Do you know, 
it is one of the most difficult problems that we have, to secure 
good office boys." "You ought not to be able to get them at 
all", said I. "Every one of those boys ought to be in school". 
"Yes", said he, "it is a great pity for them that they are not in 
school". These boys of thirteen to fifteen years of age 
Avere learning absolutely nothing of office work. Their whole 
time was employed in running errands inside or outside of 
the building or in sitting on the benches talking to each other 
while waiting for calls. They would hold their" positions until 
they thought themselves too big to be errand boys and then 

71 



r> 



they would look for different jobs. But for what jobs were 
they fitted? 

The Cincinnati idea of half-time or cooperative schools was 
in my mind at the time, and it suggested the possibility of the 
half-time school for office boys, a school in which half of the 
boys could go, either alternately morning and afternoon, or 
every other day, or every other week, as might be found ex- 
pedient. A few large corporations might combine to establish 
a half-time business school to accommodate say fifty boys and 
employ 100 office boys half time, so that fifty would be working 
half a day, or half a week, or every other week, while the other 
fifty were at school. Thus half of the boys might go to school 
from 8 A. M. to noon and be at work from 1 to 6 P. M. and 
the other half of the boys would be at work from 8 A. M. to 
1 P. M. and at school from 2 to 6 P. M. The course 
should be two years, say 14 to 16 years of age, and the subjects 
taught might be spelling, penmanship, commercial arithmetic, 
bookkeeping, filing and indexing, making out bills, type- 
writing, stenography, business forms and correspondence, 
tracing, blue printing, etc. The proposed school would be a 
step toward the solution of several problems. It would provide 
schooling for boys from 14 to 16 who are not now learning 
anything. It would train a most desirable class of office help, 
and it would provide plenty of good boys to run errands, for 
many boys would be willing to be errand boys for half-time 
during two years if they were getting an education in the 
meantime, who would not be errand boys for two full years 
if they got no education during that time. 

Is not the idea worthy of consideration by some philanthro- 
pist who is interested in the problem of the education of the 
boys who are now leaving school at far too early an age? 



72 



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